200,000 or 95,000 private-sector jobs or 50,000, our answer will be the same. we have more work to do. we have to embrace and implement policies that help our economy grow and create jobs. that is why the president is putting forth the budget he will put forward on wednesday and that is the spirit and the objective that has guided all of his budget proposals. >> is it fair to say that we as a country are feeling the effects of the sequestered? >> again, to a degree that is hard to measure early on, yes. i think we are feeling the negative effects in other ways, the kids who are not in head start this week are feeling it. their parents are feeling it. folks who have been furloughed or who worked in air traffic control towers that are closed. there has been a lot of focus in

washington on white house tours, which is an unfortunate result of the implementation. if you look at the regional impact, it focuses on real people, and how they have been hurt by this unnecessary policy in the unfortunate decision by republicans to not just allow it to happen but to embrace it as a political victory and a home run. >> i spoke to some folks on the democratic side there were uneasy about this because they said you are giving speaker gaynor and the house republicans too much -- speaker boehner and the house republicans too much leverage. this a way right now? president is putting forward is a budget, not a single policy proposal. it is not line items that he is

giving away or taking. isis a budget proposal that broad and comprehensive, of that represents a balanced approach to helping our economy grow, reducing our deficit and providing opportunity for those that aspire to the middle class. if the charges that he should not be serious about trying to find common ground, he disagrees with that. he believes we should. but make no mistake. he is not going to embrace republican proposals that suggest we should just us seniors, just take retirement -- take entitlement reform changes and not take a balanced approach to deficit reductions. seniors,t is on middle-class families, those the benefit on education assistance or others and folks to benefit

hugely from the tax code, a who pays aividual far more effective tax rate than most people in this room and teachers, nurses, bus drivers, that they should be asked to do nothing. that is never going to be the president's position. >> i have a non-budget question. >> come on, you enjoyed that. >> president obama yesterday called the california attorney camelal camelhair s -- harris by far the best looking attorney general.

this reflects a pattern of time a woman's jobdyin performance to her appearance. how has he reacted to that? >> he called her last night and spoke to her. he apologized for the buzz this has created. they are old friends. i will note that he called her, in those same comments, brilliant, dedicated and tough. she has been a remarkable attorney general. she has been a key player in mortgage settlements that will help many middle-class families struggling to deal with the mortgage situation in this country. he believes and fully recognizes challenges women continue to face in the workplace and that they should not be judged on appearance. he apologized for creating this distraction and believes very

strongly that attorney general harris is an excellent attorney general and that she has done great work and is dedicated and tough and brilliant. , the judgehe fda said that the decisions of the secretary were "arbitrary, capricious and unreasonable." that was his opinion. the president obviously sibelius'ssecretary civilian position on the us. >> i would refer that to the department of justice. it is important to remember, however, that the secretary's decision was not about whether plan b would be available to women, but whether it would be

available over the counter to girls of all ages without consulting a health care professional. she made the decision she made. the president use it as a very common-sense decision. he and other parents would agree it is a common-sense solution. beyond that, i would leave it to the justice department -- he supported the secretary's decision. the presidentid -- twice you said that the president apologized for the destruction. did he not think the remark was sexist? >> apologize for the remark. they are old friends. look, the president has known her for a long time and he apologized for it. he apologized that it called the destruction that rihanna referred to. that rihannan

referred to. he apologized for it and believe she is a superb attorney general for the state of california. she has done an excellent job in all areas, especially on the mortgage settlement issue. >> are you saying the plan be decision is common sense because it is a contraceptive? you can get tylenol over the counter and that is more dangerous. >> the president spoke at length about this from the podium. his views about this are best expressed by him. i could read them to you, but they are available on-line. those are his views. he believes it was a common- sense decision. secretary sibelius said that not all of those who could access this medication would be able to read the label and follow the

instructions appropriately. the president supported the decision and believes it is the right decision. >> but is that because it is a contraceptive, not because it is a dangerous product? >> it could be dangerous if misused, and the president felt it was the right decision to make. >> in the budget statements this morning, there was a reference kindergarten [inaudible] how much tax would be required to offset that cost? >> i do not have specifics for you. if i gave all the specifics now, you would not have anything to write about or ask about on wednesday. president obama believes universal pre-k's is an make int investment to

our future and is widely recognized to be a sensible policy approach that will pay dividends and benefits well in excess of the cost if we can get it done. that is correct that his proposal, his budget will -- all of the investments in his budget will be paid for, entirely, within his budget. this particular investment will be paid for by a cigarette tax, which he believes is the right way to go in this case. getting all of our kids into pre-k's would have enormous positive impacts for the kids, and their families, and for kids futures in the education system and beyond that in the work force in the years to come. >> should we expect some master plan in the budget next wednesday?

lot about learned a what is on the budget thus far. we will wait until wednesday to provide more details. >> will they show specifics? >> there will be more details in the budget. >> will it show how they are paid for? >> again, i would ask you to wait, but i can tell you that everything the president proposes will be paid for. >> some of the criticism from democrats is by his including the cvi and some of these other things, that this becomes a starting point, that he has already given it away. why are you taking this strategy? >> the budget reflects his

priorities within a budget world that is not ideal. within the budget decision making process that is not ideal, obviously, as he sees it. it requires compromise, negotiation, and a willingness to accept that you will not get 100% of what you one. i can tell you that he is not negotiating away items of his budget. he is presenting a comprehensive proposal that is balanced in nature, that asks the wealthiest americans and those to get special deals through our tax code to give up those tax breaks in the name of further deficit reduction, and he also includes entitlement reforms that he believes can be achieved as part of a balanced package that will protect our seniors and allow us to reduce our deficit in a way that also allows the economy to grow and create jobs. that will put us on a foundation

economically that will allow us to grow well into the future. there is no question that it is not what he would do if he could ort pass the budget himself if democrats could dictate everything that would come out of it. but we have made clear, since the president made this offer to speaker bay near you have asked me, others in this room have the did speaker boehner, you have asked me, others in this room have asked me many times about the proposals. i think it stands in stark contrast to the intransigence and embrace of ideological purity that the republican budget presents. we have been having this discussion for several years about how to get our deficit under control and how to do it in a way, as we emerge from the great recession, that keeps the economy growing and creates jobs. the president has always taken an approach that says we have to do this in a balanced way.

the well-off and well-connected have to contribute as well. his proposals represent the spirit of compromise, a spirit of compromise that does not forsake his principles but the recognizes he cannot get everything he wants. what he asks, and i think what the american people are asking, is that republicans do not -- the republicans accept that they will not get everything they want. from century-old tax breaks need to be done away with. the tax code use and the exemptions in and to reduce your burden if you're a millionaire and a billionaire, we cannot afford that anymore. the alternative to doing it in a balanced way is the way we have seen from republicans, which is

middle-class americans taking a massive hit, a senior citizens taking a huge hit, investments that help our economy grow in the future even serrated, and those same people who should be asked to give a little bit more -- is eviscerated, and the same people who should be asked to give a little bit more are getting tax cuts. i do not know what debate people missed last year, but this was debated and discussed, and the american people were pretty clear about what direction they wanted to go. >> are there any evacuations from the american embassy in south korea? >> know. i would refer you to the state department, but no. what i said about north korea and its bellicose rhetoric --

this is a familiar path and a familiar pattern that we're seeing out of the regime. we're taking all necessary precautions. they have been reported on. we will continue to do that. we're working with our allies in south korea. we're trying to get the chinese to use their influence with the north koreans to persuade them and toge their behavior urge them toward a path that will allow them to assist their own citizens, feed their own people and allow their economy to grow instead of atrophied. the leadership in north korea says a lot of things. it tends to be bellicose and provocative as of late. none of those actions are helpful toward stability and

peace in the region. >> [indiscernible] syria puts the numbers that 80 million now displaced. do you have any kind of new plan? theever is being done for last four years is not working. ?o you have anything new >> the president will, in these meetings, discuss the tragic

situation in syria, there is no question, as well as other topics. the united states, as you know, is the single largest donor of humanitarian aid to the syrian people, who have been tragically affected by bashar al-assad's brutal repression of his own people. we will continue to work with our partners in the effort to provide assistance to the syrian people. we also will continue the effort in support of the syrian opposition. we have provided substantial non-legal aid to the opposition. tore working with partners help the opposition help itself and we will continue to do that. the president will be having with leaders from the region will focus on a number of issues, including, of course, syria, which is very

important, and on which the president is really focused. this is a problem and a situation we are constantly on,orking with our partners and our policies are being constantly reviewed to see if we thefind new ways to assist opposition and we will continue to do that. one more. >> there is a big judiciary hearing coming up on wednesday to thehe importance courts in having holes filled. from the president's perspective, how important is it to get those holes filled to get his agenda move forward, particularly on the d.c. court. >> it is not a question of getting his agenda move forward. it is a question of a fair process. in ad the other day prolonged and brilliant top of the briefing that these delays

are something might triple or quadruple the rate the were in effect under president george w. bush. while we have seen some progress and some nominees confirmed of late, we still have far too many vacancies on a number of courts across the country. the president hopes and urges the senate to move forward with consideration of nominees. the problem we have seen as we have had a number of nominees who have been confirmed unanimously out of committee who are then held up month after month after month, and then once areblock has been lifted, confirmed overwhelmingly. normal americans who are out there wondering how washington works and why it seems dysfunctional in their view could look at that process and scratched their head and say wait, if there was not a problem, if the votes were there from both sides, from both

parties, why did it take 134 days? unfortunately, the answer is politics. it is using this confirmation process to attempt to achieve other aims, which is doing harm to our judiciary. >> i spoke to senator grassley the other day and he said the problem, at least from his perspective, is that the nominations have been slow getting to them. >> how does the explain the 134 day average wait for nominees compared to something like 30 odd days under president george w. bush? these are existent, not hypothetical nominees that have been waiting far too long for proper consideration by the senate. thank you come everybody. the week ahead. on monday, the president will travel to hartford where he will

continue calling on the american people to join him in calling on congress to pass common-sense measures to reduce gun violence. the president and first lady will invite music legends and contemporary artists to the white house for a celebration of memphis soul music on tuesday. on wednesday, the president will deliver a statement on his budget at the white house. in the evening, the president will meet with 12 republican senators for dinner. on thursday, the president will award an army chaplain the medal of honor for conspicuous gallantry at the white house. he will receive the honor posthumously for serving in the first cavalry division during combat operations against an armed enemy in korea and as a prisoner of war from november 1st-second, 1950. the first lady will also attend

this event. on friday, the president will welcome the united states naval academy football team to the white house to present them with the 2012 commander-in-chief trophy. and that is the week ahead. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2013] >> lauren frost and camille torfs-leibmaare third-place winners in c-span's studentcam contest. they attend eastern middle school in silver spring, maryland. in their video, lauren and camille ask the president to focus on water quality and the environment. ♪ >> everybody needs clean water. we rely on it to drink, cook, clean, and to live. yet we standby and watch corporations violate national laws daily.

40% of rivers and 46% of lakes in the united state are too polluted to fish, swim, and drink. president1960's, lyndon b. johnson called the potomac river a national disgrace. it was choked with pollution from shore-to-shore algae slime across it so thick that you could deep your hand in it and your hand would come out green as if you had stuck your hand in a can of green paint. >> on june 21, 1969, the cuyahoga river in cleveland ohio caught fire when a train rolled by and its sparks flew off the track, uniting the vast oil spots in the river. >> in 2002, the u.s. reached a record for largest dead zone in u.s. history. it sits at the mouth of the mississippi river. when it rains, runoff filled with sewage and many other harmful chemicals are washed off streets and is drained into the mississippi river and enters the gulf of mexico.

this nutrient overload leads to a surplus of algal blooms, killing the majority of aquatic life in the area. >> in 2012, this dead zone was the size of connecticut. >> in april of 2010, the bp infamous oil spill terrorized the country. >> nearly 200 million gallons of toxic crude oil were spilled in some of the richest, most diverse waters anywhere in the world. we know that thousands of birds were killed -- whales -- everything from shrimp to sperm whales, plankton to pelicans. we know that there were plumes of oil the size of manhattan at 3,000 feet of water careening through this gulf. we know that this is was a carpet of oil up to two inches thick that has been found up to 80 miles from that spill site. >> local and national water protection efforts were written until 1972 when the clean water act was firmly established. containsean water act

a very democratically principled provision, which allows for suits and civil suits penalties in the event the responsible agency is not enforcing its own law to protect citizens' rights to safe, clean water. >> according to the epa, the clean water act prohibits anybody from discharging pollutants to a point source into a water of the united states unless they have an npds permit. the permit contents limit on what you can discharge, monitoring and reporting requirements, and other provisions to ensure that the discharge does not hurt water quality or people's health. an npds permit will specify an acceptable level of pollutant or pollutant parameter in a discharge. npds permits make sure the state's mandatory standards for clean water and the federal minimums are being met. >> the national pollutant

discharge illumination system is basically the system that we have in place to ensure that we have fishable and swimmable water here in the united states. what we do is basically -- it is illegal for any point source to pollutant into our waters without getting a permit, and then we allow polluters to receive a permit to discharge into the water. >> numerous other acts have been proposed as well, each focusing on individual aspects of water quality and protection. >> the continuous efforts, permits, and acts seem like great solutions to providing all americans with clean water but sadly, corporations all over the united states are constantly violating these permits. >> laidlaw international incorporation works with waste collection embossing and needs to dump mercury on a regular basis. laidlaw broke the discharge limitation in their npds permits 13 times as well as committing 13 monitoring and 10

reporting violations. similar violations occur all across the united states. these kinds of pollution are classified as point source pollution but there is also nonpoint source pollution. >> it does not actually cover agricultural runoff like waste from turkey farms and chicken farms we have here in maryland, and so this is clearly not a strong-enough system to ensure that we are going to have the clean water that we deserve in maryland. aswe need clean water described in the clean water act but what is being done to maintain it? organizations such as friends of the earth are working on strengthening the requirements. we need to make polluters realize that dumping into our precious resource will be more of a hassle in the long-term in

thinking of a way to get rid of the pollution once and for all. >> one of things that we hear at friend of earth really care about is making polluters pay for their pollution, putting a price on pollution. we let polluters pollute for free. we do not charge them for what they discharge into rivers and streams. by putting a price on pollution, we would have a real economic incentive to produce in a more responsible and more sustainable fashion. >> what do we still need to do? every year 14 billion pounds of sewage, sludge, and garbage are dumped into the world's oceans. on top of that, another 19 trillion gallons of waste are discharged. to ensure that generations after us have clean water, we need to do more than charge these companies for polluting. we need to educate people about their affect on local waterways. we also have to limit the amount of pollution that a company is allowed to dump into the water under a permit. >> i think that permitting part of a larger solution to protecting our water. obviously, we have had the

clean water act 1972. it has a stated aim of making every river and stream in the united state fishable and swimmable. we have fallen far short of that, so we are clearly not doing enough to protect our water. this system, while better than nothing, is clearly inadequate. >> the clean water act and npds permits are not as strong as they need to be. we as a country need to take action to strengthen the permits and the acts so we can make earth's water swimmable, fishable, and drinkable. it is time to make some significant changes to the system in place. these changes include charging companies to obtain the permits, strengthening limits on the amounts of pollution companies can dump into a river under the program, and institute strict pollution guides for all of america's water. >> dear mr. president, help us look towards the future and create strictly enforced

national laws that protect our waters for the present and future. let us work together to make our waters swimmable, drinkable, and fishable for ourselves and the generations to come because water pollution affects everyone. >> you can find this video and others at studentcam.org. >> in headlines today, two freshmen democratic senators have joined lawmakers who say they support a marriage. 49 democrats, two independents and two republicans now say they support gay marriage. there are now only four democrats in the senate who have not expressed support for gay marriage. haveepublican senators announced they do support a marriage. to,etime tonight on c-span

in step with republican -- c- , in depth with senator tom coburn. he plans to retire. p.m., a look at the women's suffrage parade in washington, d.c.. american history tv in primetime at 8:00 p.m. eastern on c-span- 3. >> all of us here in the colorado river basin, or watershed, and we're talking about between 35 million-40 million people in the united states and mexico, we all depend on the colorado river as our basic water source. we needed for everything. we need it for municipal use, to drink. we needed for our houses.

we needed for industry. we need it for mining. and the biggest water user out here is still agriculture. we cannot grow anything without it. it is considered to be the most litigated river in the world, and that is probably accurate. 13, 15 majorbably laws that have spanned the whole 20th-century up until the present time that talk about who gets how much of its water, how much every year, how to share it, and our relationship with mexico and water as well. >> this weekend, book tv and american history tv tour the literary life of mesa, arizona. >> earlier this week, former

treasury secretary henry paulson spoke about china's economic and political challenges. he also addressed u.s.-china relations, the new chinese leadership, and economic threats. [applause] >> it is a pleasure to welcome you to george washington university where we are honored to host a conversation, a preview event for the 2013 "fortune" global forum which this year will be held in chengdu, china. it brings together chief executives and global thought leaders to discuss national commerce and other issues. this year i am delighted to announce george washington university will become the first and so far the only educational partner for the "fortune" global forum. it will provide access for

students and faculty and alumni to very important content that is developed there, but also "fortune" will have access to our faculty expertise. it is now a pleasure to introduce today's speakers for this preview event. henry, better known as hank, paulson, was sworn in as the 74th secretary the united states department of treasury in 2006. as the secretary, the president's leading policy advisor on a broad range of domestic and international economic issues. in 2011 he founded the paulson institute, a nonpartisan center at the university of chicago, to promote sustainable economic growth and a cleaner environment. before he entered public service, secretary paulson held several leadership positions at goldman sachs, including that of chief executive officer. longtary paulson has

advocated the building of a stronger relationship between the united states and china. while at goldman sachs he established the firm's china presence and encouraging collaboration between the two largest economies has been a core purpose of the institute. he has written numerous articles on u.s.-china relations, on the nature conservancy's asia-pacific council and research on chinese investment in the united states. andy serwer was named managing editor of fortune in october 2006. his responsibilities included overseeing "fortune" magazine and fortune.com with a combined readership of 11 million readers and the digital media and the conferences. under his tenure, "fortune" was named to ad age hot list in 2012. in 2010 he won the society of business editors and writers award for best in business general excellence. that year the magazine also received a new york press award for the 2009 reporting on bernie madoff. he joined "fortune" in 1985 as

an intern and served as reporter and editor on stories about wall street, investing, information technology, and entertainment. he is a regular guest on msnbc's morning joe and cnbc's squawk box. from 2001-2006 he was business editor for cnn's american morning. join me in welcoming secretary hank paulson and mr. andy serwer. >> thank you. thank you very much, president knapp and to everyone here at george washington university. thank you to all the students and everyone else who has come here today. we are delighted to see you all. and also thank you, secretary paulson, for coming. and having this conversation with us.

let's get right to it. the conversation today, of course, is about china and the united states relationship with china. as president knapp suggested, hank is uniquely qualified to discuss this given his role in government at goldman sachs and the nonprofit world. each one of those roles is salient in a unique way to what is going on in china and the relationship, the u.s.-china relationship. i think you will see that. thes get right to may be most important topic with regard to china right now. mr. secretary, the changeover in leadership. i know you have said the good news is that president xi

jinping is a strong leader. the bad news is that he has to be one. i wonder if you can explain exactly what you mean by that. >> yes. and let me also say, it is good to be back in washington. if only for a day. particularly good to be here with all of you. andy, you stole my line. he is a strong leader, and they have a strong leadership team. we can talk a little bit about that. but i think they've got some real challenges. this leadership team is going to be tested by challenges domestically and internationally over the next 10 years. managing that economy, the scale they have to manage it given the pace of change is just unprecedented. their current economic model, i think, is running out of steam. i think they need to reinvent that. he has some other major challenges. he really needs to make some

big changes in governance. institute the rule of law, which is very necessary for continued business, economic, and political success. the environment is a big area of concern and protests. needing to address the dirty air and the dirty water. correction, again, which is infuriating a lot of chinese, particularly over issues like property rights and so on, it is a big challenge. this leader i think it's particularly strong. the standing committee, which of the senior leadership group of the party, the standing committee of the politburo is now seven rather than five. it will be much easier to reach consensus. xi jinping, the president, and leak and john -- and the premier are two members who are not term limited so they will be there presumably for 10 years. the other five are really good getting things done. and expectations are very high

in the country. you would have to look back and just remember how high expectations here after president obama was elected. they are high because there is a general perception which i agree with, reforms which stalled for at least five years. there's a lot to be done. they are high because his leadership style is very appealing, very different. he speaks extemporaneously. he has said when people meet with him some of bureaucrats aren't to come in and just read talking points. that he has really spoken out against some of the abuses of power and some of the perks. he wants to do away with so many of the motorcade that disrupt traffic. you are not to have sumptuous

entertaining. when i had lunch at the embassy here a couple of months ago to say goodbye to the ambassador, i came away a little bit hungry. instead of the standard 8, 9 courses, it was four courses and a soup. he said there would be no more hard liquor served when the military entertains. liquor company stock to drop to 10% the next day. there's not as many people in

the vip waiting rooms and the casinos at macau. thingss done some symbolically. thenderstands the role private sector has got to play. i think expectations are high. but there's a lot that needs to be done. it's really a difficult challenge running an economy, where you just take a look at what happened. never in the history of the world has there been a country of that size that has had so much change so quickly. and the expectations of the chinese people are continuing to grow.

so, to continue to manage the change, and to put into place reforms on the scale in which he is going to have to do it, and the place of a vested interest -- and people are going to be fighting for the status quo -- his leadership team has his work cut out. >> you touched on a number of challenges in terms of the economy switching him a production economy to a consumption economy, the environmental factors, the political factors vis a vis some of the neighbors. but i want to talk about corruption. when i talk to some people in

china, they seem to indicate it could be problem number one. the feeling among many people in china, perhaps, is to get ahead in china you don't play by the rules. the feeling that that is something that has changed and is different from what it was 10 years ago, and that this is something that president xi needs to address and is very keen on addressing, do you think that is correct? >> let's step back and little bit and talk about rules. the reason i started off when i talk about the challenge, i talked about instituting the rule of law. as you look at the history of china's economic reform, they moved very, very quickly. and so, to move that quickly, they use pilot programs. they encouraged innovation and various activities, which were really at head the rules they had in place. it has been a country -- it is a country ruled by men as opposed to law. that is probably an

oversimplification. but i think the reason that i and so many others went as frequently as we did to china was relationships were very, very important. the country is now at a size and a scale where, for them to be successful, they are going to need to engage in institution building to be able to implement, not only to have laws in beijing and roles but to be able to implement and enforce the rules across a wide range of areas. from the environment to securities laws, and so one. -- and so on. a lot has to do with not just rules and institutions but it has to do with good governance and transparency. i really believe that the only way for this to work is both the leaders and citizens have got to be invested in the rules- based system. so, now you come to corruption. this is a serious problem and it is infuriating people.

i would say the biggest source of anger -- there are a number -- but one of the biggest sources has to do with property rights. nina civil officials -- municipal officials taking and selling land, which is one of the big financing vehicles for urbanization. but going after that corruption, the head of the disciplinary committee and a member of the standing committee is the man we know well here. he was my counterpart at the sed and has been one of the top economic reformers in china. he knows how to get things done. >> the strategic -- >> excuse me, strategic economic dialogue. it is not an easy challenge because you have to go after it. i am sure, looking at it systemically. and then they will need and already have had some very well-publicized examples in terms of government officials, good business people.

this is a significant problem, and as xi has said, it is a significant problem and they are taking it on. not just in china. in much of the developing world, this is a significant problem. >> perhaps get magnified by the rate of growth. >> because china is so large. don't think there is more corruption in china than there is in india, for instance. or many other places in the world. but because china is such a big engine in the world economy, and there's so much change there, that it is a huge issue. >> i do have questions from all of you, or some of you, that you submitted, and we will get those. a lot of things we want to touch on first.

sustainability, i mentioned, is something you are very keen on. something that is really the focus of the paulson initiative and the paulson institute. having a sustainable economic growth plan, a model, perhaps, a rising china on how to implement sustained economic growth. environmentalthe problems in china, mr. secretary. i am frankly a little bit surprised they haven't been addressed liquor. and i think i share that feeling with maybe some others. in fact, the problems it seemed to be getting worse over the past couple of years, accelerating over the past

couple of months. of course, the pollution in beijing, the dead pigs in the river in shanghai. and i have seen stories in the paper this week about these problems. what will it take for china to really begin to address it? it seems at some point, the cost of not doing anything will exceed the cost of sitting still -- or changing it, i should say. >> andy, as you said, the paulson institute is a think and do tank, not-for-profit. it is focused on u.s.-china because we are the biggest economies in the world, biggest

consumers of energy, biggest emitters of carbon. so a lot is focused -- a lot of our focus is on having economic growth and having it be sustainable. everything from investment in the u.s., encouraging chinese investment in the u.s. that leads to more jobs in the u.s., to leadership practices, best practices in business for the leaders of the state owned enterprises and other big companies in china that are seeking to become leading global companies. and then a big part of it is focused around sustainable urbanization. because that will be, in my judgment, the biggest economic event of the first part of this century, with another 300 million chinese to go to the cities. that is going to be a driver of economic and environmental outcomes. you are right, we need a new

model of growth. but let's get to your question specifically about the environment. because as i explain it to people, the chinese have done some extraordinary things in terms of the amount of an investment they have made in alternative sources of energy in the clean technology. the largest user of wind. they are going to be a huge user of the solar. they've got a big percentage of manufacturing capacity of solar. they've shut down many more dirty power plants than we have. but they have been winning some battles but may be losing the overall war because of the good things they've done has -- because the good things they've done have been overwhelmed by

the pace of growth. they now recognize it. the public is demanding it. and also growth -- sustainability, i think, too many people i think has just been a buzzword. i think people are beginning to really understand the growth model is not sustainable. what is another point of gdp worth when people are dying of dirty water, dirty air? there are all kinds of estimates about what the drag is on economic growth of the dirty environment. some people to leave several percentage points. but it is clearly not sustainable. and i think all of us in the world need to really rethink some things. you know, economic growth and environmental protection are not at odds, not -- opposite sides of the same coin when you look at it on a longer-term view

and you are looking at longer- term prosperity. and i think the chinese and all of us need a new economic framework that basically says that we need a model of economic growth that lets us increase our standard of living while recognizing the scarcity of resources, natural resources, and not undermining the ecosystem and environment we need for water, food, the air we breathe, for energy. i think we are close to the tipping point globally in these issues. and of course, the chinese are focused on this big time. and they need a new model of urbanization. and i believe they will achieve

one. that is why i am spending the amount of time i am spending there. >> do you get the feeling i'm a though, the alarm bell has gone off recently? >> first of all, they have been focused on this for some time, they understand it. but what you see, the dirty has gotten a lot of attention. of course, the air in beijing is dirty. largely because of there is a cold winter and you've got these migrant workers who don't have the same economic benefit that others have in china -- something in the neighborhood of 300 million migrants from the farms that come to the cities and they don't have the same economic benefits, they don't have the same education benefit, and to keep themselves warm they have been burning dirty coal -- well, coal, which is the cheapest coal they can find, to stay warm. when you look more broadly -- i

spent a lot of time with people who are my contemporaries, and some of whom discount climate change. when you are looking at 50 degrees below in russia, snowing in istanbul, burning tires to stay warm in kuala lumpur, the: beijing, --the coal in beijing, i think there is a serious global problem and i don't think we can solve this from the u.s. alone. the only way to solve it is to develop nuclear technologies that can be rolled out on a cost efficient basis in scale in the developing world, particularly china. >> migrant workers -- not just cars on the coal-fired power

plants? >> i just say this -- because i will get to this--when you say what are the things that china needs to do in terms of economic model for reform, you start off by saying -- which is true -- they need to move toward more elastic growth and biggest services sector and less reliance on exports and heavy government investment in infrastructure and resource -- exports. but they also need to normalize the labor market, which is a tricky thing to do. but if they do it, and if they take the restrictions off of the migrant workers as they go to the city -- and if it is

done properly -- there will be a construction dividend. second probably the thing i say they need to do. the third thing i would point out, which we talked about, is to deal with these environmental issues that are so tough. they also need to continue the reform of the state owned enterprises. and they need to reform the financial markets, which we've talked about, and also this urbanization -- they need a new model for urbanization. where they are going to be able to continue this process on the magnitude and scale which is unprecedented and do it where they minimize some of the social, environmental, and economic stresses. a big part of it will be municipal finance. because right now they are overly reliant on land sales. taking the farmer's land, selling it, and ok means of finance. so you need to come up with a system where mayors and

governors, whether on budget that is transparent and they've got authority. so, they've got a lot to do. >> let's switch over to another difficult subject, quite frankly, which is hacking. a tricky subject when it comes to u.s. -- chinese -- u.s.- chinese relations. a couple of questions. is the chinese government behind hacking institutions in the united states, companies and governments? if so, how bad is it? and if so, how should the u.s. respond? >> ok, well, let me start with a little background. first of all, i think all governments engage in intelligence gathering vis a vis other governments. so the big point of friction and tension comes when a government or a company gathers

intelligence through hacking, gathers intelligence in the trade secrets, from u.s. companies. that is the point of friction. here, i started off by saying i think it is really important for all companies to do everything they can to protect themselves against cyber theft of all kinds. and it is also the responsibility of the government to help ensure that this economic -- in short economic security. so now, let's move to china. this is a major area of tension with china, and rightfully so. somesperately need international, some global protocols in ways of enforcing

this. we need to find common ground with china on these things. because it is in everyone's interest to make sure that economic security is aintained. ow,at it, -- now, as i look at it, the chinese has the same interest as we do and every other nation in preserving our global economic system and not have it collapse because we can't agree on rules to enforce economic stability. this, to me, is something that

is a really important area. >> so, what do you think -- just to follow up on that -- do you think the obama administration -- the obama administration has been slow to criticize china or call china on this. but recently they did. do you think that is an appropriate response? >> i think the obama administration has clearly got a responsibility to help our ompanies protect their intellectual property and their trade secrets. and i think as we look at what we need in this country, we need, i think, stronger laws. we need to be able to enforce he laws.

i think businesses need to do a much better job of hardening their computer systems. so they are not as vulnerable. and they need to do a better job of reporting and attack immediately. and we need the laws and we need to enforce those laws. >> in your book "on the brink those quote and i should let everyone know you are working on a new book about china which will be out in a year or so, early next year. in the meantime, everyone should have read, and hope, your first book -- i believe your first book, am i right? "on the brink." t is about the financial crisis. one thing i pulled out that was interesting was in september of 2008, things were bad, obviously deteriorating very fast in the united states.

you notified then the vice premier to give him an update on hat was going on here. you kind of warned him and he said, maybe things are ok, and ou -- he said, actually, hank, maybe things could get worse. i thought was a fascinating interchange. how and how closely do the chinese monitor the u.s. economy? >> well, i think, of course they monitor it carefully. they were highly relying in -- and they are highly reliant on exports. i think the financial crisis was the first wake-up call they had. i think the second one was the european crisis. and i think now they just really understand -- what is their economy? eight dollars trillion now? -- $8 trillion now. europe, the u.s., and japan is

$35 trillion. they can insulate themselves from what is happening in the broader world when they are as reliant as they are on exports. another reason why they are working so hard to do more to mastech wide growth. -- domestic-wide growth. the chinese were very aware of what was going on. they are big investors of treasury securities. they are the largest holder of our treasuries. the largest foreign holders of fannie mae and freddie mac ecurities. so, they had a big interest. frankly, i think the relationships we maintain and the level of trust we built up through the strategic economic dialogue, it led to a very constructive relationship.

and they behaved in a very responsible way throughout the risis. and we communicated frequently. even to the point that when eorge bush made a very important decision, which was to -- when he called the global leaders meeting to deal with the crisis, he made a decision to go with the g 20. hereto for you had the g7 finance ministers, g-8, and there was a g-20 group including central bankers. he thought the g-20 group was more representative of the global economy. he rightfully had some concerns and said, would there be a onstructive outcome? one of the things he asked before hand was he asked me to

take a quick sounding to the president to see whether the chinese were willing to assume a leadership role or play a constructive role and they got back very quickly. which i think then made it easier for president bush to ecide to go with the g-20, which obviously made a lot of sense. >> sticking with the financial sector -- what is the number one priority in terms of reform that china should look to in the financial sector? >> to come down to number one, i think, is difficult. there are several things that they need to do. one thing i would look at to see how serious they are about reform is to say, will they open

up their markets to foreign competition? because i can't -- i don't know of a single market where there -- efficient, world-class capital markets where you don't let the best institutions come in and compete. it's hard to run a world-class institution as a joint venture. so, the argument that i made to the chinese is if you let foreign banks come in, they are going to be regulated by the chinese. they will be employing chinese professionals. and it is only by doing that you will have world-class financial markets. things that i think are important to the chinese are that right now the private sector is not getting the capital base in the current system. and having a really efficient

capital markets, you are going to come up with a more efficient allocation of capital to the r. -- private sector. and the other thing is investors. investors in china -- do you have a bit of a real estate bubble. when you say where can they invest their money, real estate is one of the few areas where they feel comfortable. investing. i argue, having world-class investing institutions in their will help china become a nation of investors and not just savers. right now you have over savings in china for two reasons. one, it is fear-based. you don't have adequate safety net, social security and welfare, and the other is, they don't get really good returns on their investments.

so, interest rate liberalization will be really important. what happens is the chinese investors have two places to go, either in real estate or you could put it in a bank savings account and not get the rate of inflation. and then that is a subsidy that it passed on to state owned enterprises in terms of lower borrowing rate but it doesn't help the private sector and it doesn't help the chinese favor - safer or investor. interest rate liberalization would be one thing to really look at. and opening up to competition so you cannot world-class institutions. >> do you think they are likely to happen? >> i am optimistic because when you look at what they have done -- the chairman of pboc, their central bank -- he reached retirement age and then he asks

to stay on. he has been a big advocate of financial market reform. and another, a real reformer, working with juan je in the old days and is now the minister of finance. the chinese sec, will be chaired by a man -- i know him well, he was chairman of the bank of china. again, i think these are all very knowledgeable professionals, pro-reformers. but it remains to be seen. because i would say anywhere you have success, a certain amount of success, there is resistance to change. so, i would just simply say, we

have a very different system but we have a vested interest in our system and they have vested interest in their system, so they are going to be anti-reformers. >> i want to switch to questions from the audience. this is one from luis -- what are your thoughts about the recent apple-china dispute? do you think it was necessary for tim cook to issue a public apology to the chinese eople? >> luis, i read the same "wall street journal" and "financial times" article you read. o let me put it in perspective. hina is a huge market. and u.s. companies and all sorts of companies are benefiting greatly by participating in that

arket. so apple historically had looked at china as sort of the factory of the world. so, apple -- computers, iphones, were assembled in china and sold in the u.s. and around the world. but what has happened, as with economic growth and greater prosperity in china, it has become a big market, and market -- end market. i think it is well over $20 billion of sales this year. it is the fastest growing market. some think it is the fastest market for smart phones in the world right now. so apple got a big percentage -- got a big stake in that market. and i think what you're going to see if foreign companies -- and there's a good number of u.s.

companies and other foreign companies who got leadership positions, they are going to be under a lot of scrutiny. they are going -- under a lot of -- they are going to be held to high standards by regulators. i am not saying all of this is fair, but i will tell you when the chinese look at what happens to some of their companies in the u.s., they don't always think it is fair. would say the good news for apple and for the u.s. and for the chinese and for the world is that to the fastest growing export market, that a that is growing very quickly and it is very important to apple. and what happened is they were criticized on state tv. they started off arguing that their customer service and

business norms were the same in china as elsewhere. and at the end of the day, you know, cook ended up apologizing. this is a big, important arket. >> this is a question from daschle by him saying it right -- from a gw graduate student. two questions. i think you touched on the first one. do you think china needs to make political reforms in order to achieve a sustainable -- achieve sustainable economic growth? and the second -- what is the next most important economic growth engine for china in the next few decades? >> i would say first of all him i did not talk about political eform. i do believe -- and i have always believed -- that economic

reform, economic freedom, greater economic integration with the rest of the world quite naturally will lead to more personal liberties, which it has overtimes, and political reform. now, the chinese political system is still evolving. the last transition, the one before this, the first time a sitting leader did not select a successor. this was the second one. i think the way to understand china is, they look through the lens of political stability. so, before making any tough decision -- whether international relations, whether economic issues, environmental issues, whatever, they are going to say, what is the path that is going to give us the greatest stability. the argument that i make is

speeding up economic reforms and political reforms rather than undermining stability is going to be the quickest path to stability. and i believe that will be the case, will prove to be the case for political reform. there is a lot of discussion and debate in china how the political reforms will take place. i think the general view is that will take place first within the context of the party, and experimenting with local election, the village elections, may be giving more real authority to the national congress, the people's ongress. so, i do believe it is another challenge. nd i believe that for economic

-- for real economic stability, it is going to continue political reform -- continued political reform is necessary. >> what about china's military, mr. secretary? should china expand its military and make it vigor? i ask you that given the backdrop of the islands which, i believe, is the u.s. name for the islands disputed between china and japan. and of course, what is going on in the korean peninsula? >> ok, to be with that, i give you two senses on the second question. the biggest driver. i think it will be urbanization, if they get it right. i think the productivity, if somebody goes from the farm to a second-tier city and their income goes from equivalent of $40 a month to 100 and they go o a first tier city, $200.

if they get it right and they get the consumption boost, that will be the biggest driver coming up with the urbanization model of economic growth going forward. ok. so, you've got a bunch of questions in there. ok. [laughter] >> i do. i threw them all in. >> make -- whether china should continue expanding the military, what i or you think about it is rrelevant. they will keep expanding their military. and from their perspective, our military spending exceeded the top 15 countries put together. so, i always explain to them and to everyone, it is important for us to be strong in asia and around the world economically, diplomatically, and militarily.

and our presence in the asia-pacific has been important to everyone including china, because it is sure to stability. and you've got this trade and economic cross investment and growth that has benefited all of us. now you see the two troubling hings that are going on. one, in the east china sea, the dispute between japan and china -- the japanese call it sent senkaku. when you look at the merits, it is easy to understand it from both sides. if you look at history there is merit on both sides.

but this is dangerous. i think the points that the u.s. makes continuely to both sides is there needs to be really good control right down to the boat commander level. great channels of communication at the top political level, top military levels, because there has been a lot of tension. ow, i am optimistic that the new foreign minister is a someone who speaks japanese, there is a japanese expert that he has selected to go into the role, and that both sides will e able to de-escalate. stability is totally necessary for the kinds of economic growth

that asian needs and the world needs, and for stability in the region. and then, of course, in the south china sea, that is different because this is territorial. china has territorial disputes with just about everyone. philippines, vietnam, indonesia and various countries have territorial disputes among hemselves. there went don't take sides. we simply say, listen, it is unacceptable, as it is in the east china sea with the japanese, that these be resolved peacefully. not with force, the threat of force or coercion, that they be esolved peaceably. we need some solutions in both the south china sea and the east china sea. >> korea? how long will china let that ituation continue --

>> again, i am reading the same newspapers you are. but looking from the vantage point of watching it closely and watching it when i was treasury secretary, in one respect, although this is a more extreme the relevant -- virulent form, north korea's customary disruptive outlandish hreatening behavior. this is the worst form of what we have seen, number one. we've got to case -- take it seriously when you've got a rogue state developing nuclear weapons. i look at this with your point and your question.

this is a case in point of why u.s.-china relations are so important. when i talk about it, i say it s hard to think of any major problem in the world that isn't going to be easier to solve when the u.s. and china work together and wouldn't be much more difficult to solve if we were at dds with each other. what will it take to get china aboard, and if we get china on board, it would be easier. on this one, it has been difficult because on the one hand, the chinese are very angry at the kinds of behaviors we are seeing with kim jong-un and that regime. of the other hand, they prop them up economically because

they don't want a collapsed state on their border and south korea right on their border. the way i tend to think about it, it is highly important we be communicating regularly and doing contingency planning in terms of how to deal with the worst outcomes. because if at the highest level we have the same interest, which is peace, stability, economic growth in china, asia, and around the world, but we need to be prepared in terms of how we are going to deal with -- even if they are not high likelihood outcomes, outcomes where north korea uses force or you have a collapsed state or what have you. >> we are out of time, but i do want to ask you just one more question from the audience -- what potential role, if any, do you see for international students and asian-americans in

bettering and strengthening u.s.-china ties? >> well, that is a great question. i would just start off by saying the reason that i set up the paulson institute is because i believe there will be ups and downs in our mutual relationship based upon what the issues of the day are in beijing or in ashington. and to come back to andy's point, one of the disturbing things about military relations with china is our two militaries don't like each other that much and we don't have the same level of trust as we have in the economic arena. and economic arena, there is tension, but that is the good news. 40 years ago we didn't have economic relations with china. we had no tensions. you always have tensions with

your trading partners, but if there are problems there all kinds of trust in channels of communications. we need ways the two militaries to work together on humanitarian missions, these dialogue which we are pursuing need to work better. but there's nothing like students. and the more knowledge we have of each other, the more we know about each other, the more we trust each other, the more we ill like each other. you don't make adversaries -- it is hard to become an adversary of someone you understand. and one of the biggest problems we have is we have very different systems and very different cultures. and one of the things that the united states, what we don't do particularly well, is others -- understand others' cultures and systems.

we are so proud of our system and the way we are that we think what we have in every way is what is best for every other society. so, having american students spend time in china, get to know chinese, and vice versa. this is going quickly to -- i think it is very important for u.s.-china relations going forward. >> i think it is a wonderful note to end on. obviously we covered a lot of ground, much more to talk about but we will have to save it for another day. so, please join me in thanking secretary hank paulson. [applause] [applause] thank you to everyone here at w. [captioning performed by the national captioning institute] [captions copyright national able satellite corp. 2013] >> vice president joe biden says u.s. still need an agenda to

make the u.s. competitive. he spoke today and. herself a portion of what he had to say. >> i have overwhelming confidence in the competitive capacity of the american worker. they are the most productive workers in the world today. but we will not fully realize our potential in the game is rigged and this -- there's a lot of rigging going on right now. hat's why we're troubleed, state owned so-called national om pet tors, chief inputs, artificially inflating their inputs. trade designed to induce american examples to transfer

their manufacturing as a condition of market access. keeps urement rules that american companies from a chance to compete. by governments that steal american property to increasingly, we're seeing wholesale theft of confidential business information and propriety technology through cyber intrusion. that has to stop. it has to stop. >> to stay competitive vice president biden says they must maintain their pow. the obama administration is halfway from its goal of doubling its exports. you can see all of biden's comments online at c-span.org. tonight prime time here on cr pan husband and wife documentaries talk about their

film. they address what they say is misinformation about hydraulic fracking for natural gas. afterwards we'll get your response. c-span2 in deathth with senator coburn. he has written a book and that's at 8:00 eastern. on c-span3 a look at women's history in the united states. interviews from a celebration of the 1930's suffering parade. that is tonight at 8:00 eastern. >> where is the predictability? what are the assureances that this committee and the senate has to where you will be given the background and the history? >> the teenager and in my early 20's i was a socialist.

as winston churchill said, any man who was not a socialist before he was 40 has no heart and any man that is a socialist after he's 40 has no head. that kind of evolution is common in people. >> on what you just saw, one was by the law and the other one was the einstein of the senate. you have two trains passing in the night. he was one of the toughest, hardest senators to lobby on anything. he did his homework, he studied. the other one was smart and he was brilliant. he wrote a book. these two men were passing like trains. >> more with former deputy assistant to nix and ford sunday

"q&a."t 8:00 on c-span's >> while president obama was in colorado calling for stricter gun control laws, n.r.a. president david keene was in pennsylvania offering a different solution. he spoke to the republican party about having trained armed guards at schools. his comments are about a half an hour. [applause] >> i want to say that it's a real pleasure to be here. here in pennsylvania. i have a soft spot in my heart for pennsylvania. rich was talking about the pittsburgh annual meeting that we held a couple years ago here. that's where i was elected

president of the national rifle association and got to know rich. i can't think of anybody who i would rather have introduce me. this is mr. gun rights in this state. [applause] it is a particular pleasure to be here but pennsylvania is a great state personally and from the standpoint of the national rifle association. many of you probably know this, there are more n.r.a. members in pennsylvania than any other state in the union. texas doesn't -- [applause] my wife is from texas and texans don't like to hear this but it is true. you know pennsylvania's supportive of the second amendment rights has gone a long way. the folks who live here seem to get it regardless on what part of the state they are from, particularly those in the middle

part of the state. i remember some years ago being on the panel with james, you remember him. he described pennsylvania as pittsburgh and philadelphia separated by a third world nation. [laughter] i said i beg to differ it is pittsburgh and philadelphia separated by america. [applause] so i can't think of any place i would rather be this evening. i have to tell you i was the c.e.o. ofcabela's. he said i have to tell you how come wayne lapierre gets to go to the turkey federation and the mule dinner and they send you to harvard? i said i guess that is what happens when you get second

choice. tonight, i had a chance to meet many of you. i thought this was a lincoln day dinner for the republican party and i see this is a gathering of the n.r.a. members and i truly appreciate that. [applause] you know, the national rifle association is not a partisan organization in the sense that the republican party is. i happen to be a proud republican. in terms of the second amendment, the second amendment and the right to keep and bear arms in this country is not, never has beens, and should not be a partisan position. the n.r.a. has had its support over years and has had its influence, not because we're a conservative organization or a republican organization, because we're an american organization. n.r.a. members include democrats, factory owners,

farmers, businessmen, lawyers -- yeah, lawyers too. people from every walk of life hat one can image. -- imagine. this is a lesson for politics, the strength of the n.r.a. stems from the fact that those who believe strongly in the values that we all share have something in common that goes beyond party, beyond whether they are a iberal or conservative, beyond professor, beyond class, something that mr. obama understands and this is a dedication to american freedom use and principles and freedom that gets them to step forward whenever they are challenged. this is a country, that strength derives in large part from the fact that americans have never been obsessed with politics. i have been, some people in this room may have been but most americans are not obsessed with politics. they are obsessed with their

families, living their lives, aying their taxes and enjoying themselves. the american experiment was about creating a society in which they can do that without voting their time to political ctivity. when those values are threatened our willingness to step up to the plate to do whatever is necessary, whether that threat comes from abrood or here at home -- abroad or here at home. that is what marked those who believe so strongly in our willingness and our values are toeatened we do what we need do and step forward.

politicians, many politicians, -- i was told by someone i won't name out of courtesy but someone you would be familiar with but the only reason for a party to exist is to get hold and exercise power. my response to that was that is why we got into politics in the first place. hat's not why we got active in the political sphere. we got active, not so we can hold a job, not so we can exercise power, not so we can aggregate power to ourself but we believe in things. we believe in a view of america that goes back hundreds of years and we believed in preserving the values that we inherited. we believe and do believe we want to pass on the nation and the society to the next generation that we inherited from the last. that's why we're here tonight. not simply because we're republicans. not simply because some of us are running for office or

because we hold office but because we believe. a successful party, a successful political movement has to be based on principles and bleefs, values, and tradition -- beliefs and values and traditions. and be willing to talk to others everywhere who share their view and their values. that's been the strength of the national rifle association. that is the strength of a successful political movement. it is something we must all do all the time, in every way we can. no political movement worth its suits the whims of the day. a successful organization meets the needs and the policy goals. before this last election, the n.r.a. was criticized, particularly in the media

because wayne lapierre and i and chris cox and others because we went around and said if barack obama would win another term he would threaten the rights of the american people. we were told that was a ridiculous view. one of the most level-headed journalists,chris mathews suggested on the air that wayne lapierre was insane to suggest that. during the campaign, the president said i will never take your rifle, i will never take your shotgun, i will never take your side arm, i'm a believer in the second amendment. i was asked what was it about that statement that i didn't like. i said except with what he had to go against everything he had ever said in his political life there wasn't anything wrong with

it. did n't think he believed it. i received letters from n.r.a. members, remember when we preveeve our rights and values are threatened we step up to the plate. i received letters saying i listened to the president and he sounded fine. what is with you guys? i saved those letters until election day, the day which i hoped would turn out differently but didn't and i sent all of those folks a note. noting that within two hours of barack obama's victory speech his state department notified the united nations they would like a small arms trade treaty for signing just as humanly possible. the negotiations that were going on in the u.n. at that time to come up with a treaty that they voted on this week was coming to a conclusion in august.

at that point the white house and the state department contacted the unite nation and said that the american administration would like those negotiations put on hold. somebody noticed that if things are progressing as they were, a small arms trade treaty would appear on the president's desk in september and would become an issue in the president's campaign. the one thing they wanted to avoid was second amendment issues. if they weren't able to avoid them a lot of people would step up to the plate and do what they needed to make sure their rights were safe. right after the election, the president said he wanted the treaty. i wrote to those members and i said the fact that it took two hours to send that letter is a clue.

it is clue that this guy is going to go after your rights. in newtown, connecticut they thought they saw that opportunity. the tragedy that took place there in the minds of the people at the white house and in the city of new york, it was an opportunity. an opportunity to change the debate and seek policy goals they have been seeking for decades. to begin taking guns they could, registering if they couldn't, and limiting the choices that american people have in purchasing firearms if they had to be limited to that. right after the tragedy, the president and others suggested that we needed to ban a list of guns, we needed to have all kinds of measures to keep honest americans from exercising a fundamental constitutional right, all in the name of saving the children. but, in fact, when the president named his vice president to head

a task force and invited various people to meet with him, we sent our director and he closed the door and the vice president with this, begin the president and the i know what we're going to do so let's talk about something else. it did not shock us, it did not surprise us. it is what we expected. it is our position and i think the position of the american people, that the president and his folks were asking the wrong questions. in the wake of the tragedy of newtown,they were not asking how do we protect our children? they were asking what do we do about guns? isn't this a chance to do something about guns? the n.r.a. and others suggested that was the wrong question. as a result of that we asked the former congressmen from arkansas, former u.s. attorney, former head of the drug agency

and the former number two men of homeland security to put together a task force and right -- ask the right questions and that is how do we protect our children? the task force included people like the head of the secret service. they came forward with a series of recommendations, one of which is the one way you protect your children is providing armed security to them because there are people in our society that so mentally disturbed that they are likely to do anything. we can't screen all of them out. the day after the newtown tragedy, i found myself israel touring a facility where school security officers were trained. back in the 1970's israel had a hole spade of shootings.

i put it at the time that their crazy people listen to different voices than our crazy people do but the result is the same. at first, veterans and others rallied to the cause as volunteers and provided security in their schools. over the years that system morphed into something more institutionalized. today, israel schools, each school hires in some way through the school budget or local financing private security to protect the schools in that school. they don't use the military, they don't use the police, they use trained, often veterans but trained people, especially trained to provide security in the schools to solve that problem. when i came back we suggested that is something that should be looked at in this country. a number of people said we were crazy. then they looked at it and realized out of 137,000 schools over 30,000 already have armed security so they did not want to suggest those people were crazy.

finally, the president said now was skeptical of the idea. we put together this task force and the task force agrees with what the american people said. the gallop poll shortly after newtown, asked people what did they see the problem that created this? the number one problem they saw was a mental health system that doesn't work because the kinds of people who involve themselves in this sort of thingthey are not criminals in are crazy. classic sense. they are looking for some place to vent their fantasies and hostilities and that is someplace that is not protected, among those places are movie theaters, shopping malls and the like. second, american people said the problem was we're not providing security to our schools. we provide guards at meaningless office buildings. we have armed guards at banks

and jewelry stores but not at our schools. perhaps our children are not as important as those things. we decided we need to look into this and that is why the task force was put together. this week they came back and said among other things, every school in the country, with every local law enforcement agency, with teachers, administrators, and parents, look at their facility and look at the things they can do to protect their children under their care. one of the things they should look to is providing the presence of an armed security officer. those officers could be financed through local grants, state grants, school budgets, they could be volunteers, they could be part of the administration that exists today, but they should have the training necessary to do what they need to do. we're not talking about arming every teacher and every principal, we're not talking

about simply letting these folks have firearms to do with what they will but providing the real training necessary in a shooting situation in a school. the empirical evidence suggests that in shopping malls and elsewhere, when there is someone here armed that school shootings are stopped, shootings in malls are stopped because the people who engage in this are not looking for a battle they are looking for a killing field. when the killing field is denied them they go away. we made those suggestions. those suggestions are on the table and we think will be taken seriously. interestingly, one of the parents of the children killed at newtown called and asked if he could come to the press conference and we said he could come and say what he wanted. we did not urge him to do so. he came and he said specifically

that he wanted to thank the n.r.a. because we have taken the problem that resulted in what appened in newtown seriously and have take an look what the could be done to prevent future tragedies of this sort. that's what we're doing. we take our responsibility seriously. we take our defense of the second amendment seriously. we take the concerns of our members and the citizens of this country as seriously as any organization that any of you have ever seen. most of you here, many of you here are members of the n.r.a., many of you are life members, many have been member for decades. those who aren't and even some of you who are, when you go on the street and ask someone about the n.r.a., they think of us in term as the advocacy mission. we're the organization that defends the second amendment. that's a core part of the mission of the national rifle association but that is only part of it.

the n.r.a. was formed in 1871 by a group of former union generals who saw during the civil warthat the american understanding and facility with firearms had decreased as people from europe who moved in with no firearms background, from a culture who did not use guns and the n.r.a. was the answer to that to make you are sure that americans in the future would have the same skills and same familiarity and the same appreciation of the econd amendment. two of the founders were general, and between 1871 and 1970, the national rifle association never endorsed a candidate. we didn't have a lobby organization. we didn't have a lobbyist. we didn't need a lobbyist. we didn't need a political operation.

there was widespread agreement in this country that the founders knew what they were doing when they included the second amendment in the constitution. like members of the n.r.a. included everyone from kennedy o roosevelt to humphrey. there was no partisan divide mong gun owners. that changed as the culture wars in the 1970's broke out. all of a sudden, hostility to the second amendment became an ideological card to many in this country. it was a democratic member of congress, a man who is still serving from michigan. he came to the n.r.a. and said you can teach as many people as you want about gun safety, you can teach as many people as you want about gun handling, you can train as many shooters an you want, you can provide as many

trainers as you can train, but unless you defend the second amendment, there's not going to beany hunters, there's not going to with any competitive shooters because it will be gone. because of that the institution of legislation was founded. because of that the n.r.a. got into the role, which many people see as key to our efforts today. despite of that, 90% of our funds and our efforts go into the traditional things that we're always involved in. we're involved with boy scouts, the girl scouts with competitive events and the like. we have 92,000 shooting instructors in this country. one of the things we're going to do as a result of what the group suggested is we're going to take seriously on to ourselves the

development of best practices set of training for people who will be involved in school security, whether they are police. we do train a lot of police today. whether they are school officers who are assigned to schools and one level or another, whether they are private security people or if they are school personnel. we're going to develop and provide to the extent that we can the training that these people need to be certified as having the skills necessary to protect our children. the n.r.a. has always been interested in these kinds of things and always will be. we will never and i say this before a partisan audience, we will never surrender our principles. someone criticized me because i met with someone during the course of the argument. i said i will meet with anyone, i will talk to anyone but i won't surrender. we do need, all of us, if we

believe strongly in this, we need to talk to people, we need to educate people. the one thing we don't need to do is surrender our principles nd the two things are mutually exclusive. you can talk to those who don't agree with you but you don't have to surrender. members of congress don't have to surrender and legislatures don't have to surrender. this is an example of a guy who would never surrender. when i talk to partisan groups when i talk to gun group, that is what i tell them. if you're involved because you believe never, ever surrender your beliefs. think about ways to get other people to join you. think about ways to increase your numbers. think about ways to win. that's what a party does, a proper party does.

that's what a movement does. that's what people interested in affecting the future of the country do. you know, i would like to -- i'm accused of going on too long so i'm not going to do that. i want to tell a story. we're in a position today, and i know in this room, probably 99% of the people here feel as i do about the second amendment. i was talking to a group of congressmen last summer. i was asked by one -- it was at a breakfast, he asked me what would you say the s the greatest accomplishment of the national rifle association? the n.r.a. can't take credit but the entire second amendment community and the sports community can take some credit. we live in an era if you talk to people they will talk to you about how the american culture is deteriorating.

but in terms of the second amendment, the american culture has changed for the better. if you asked someone in 1968 after the passing of the gun act or two years later when the when the thorne general proposed a confiscation of all side arms, if you suggested that we would have the rights under the second amendment that we have today, people on both sides of the aisle would laugh at you. we have those rights because we stood up and demanded those rights. we organized. the congress is not doing what the president wants it to do on second amendment issues because thousands of upon thousands upon thousands of american citizens have been calling and contacting their congressmen and senator saying don't you dare. i talked to a good friend from a gun-friendly district, a member

of congress who has been a-rated by the national rifle association. you know what that means. he says in the last three weeks i had my staff count, i received 5,000 phone calls from my own constituents and their general message is we now you've been a-rated. that was yesterday. we want to know what you're going to do today and what you're going to do tomorrow. he said i'm going to do what i did yesterday. at the end of the day, politicians listen to the people that elected them. they listen as long as those people make their opinions known. that is our job to make those people involved in the political process. that is our job as the people of america to realize that vision. people who work for us know what we expect them and what it is we want them to do. if we do that we will succeed.

at any rate, i said in answer to this question, i said you know, nobody would have guessed it would be today. when we face the last great challenge of second amendment grounds the n.r.a. had 1.8 million members. by the time we get to houston, we will have five million members. when this current battle started we had four million members. the greatest day of new membership was the day that barack obama deliveried his statement, we had 50,000 people join. the fact of the matter is so many americans out there share our values and concerns are willing to step up. what happened is that more people are involved in the shooting sports. for the first time the study of outdoor sports found that more hunting licenses were sold than in any five-year. in recent. a lot were young people. that has not happened before.

more people are going to be range to shoot than ever before. high school shooting teams that were abolished in the 1970's are coming back. providebecause we grants. i said there is a big difference between now and then. that is, today, firearms are cool. people are enjoying the shooting sports as they never have before. they are buying guns not just for self-defense but to hunt, to go to the range to shoot, to have a good time. different groups are coming in, 10 or 15 years ago, could i have gone -- but anybody have gone to a gun store and found a paint gun -- pink gun? [laughter] manufacturers don't just say i think i will make a pink gun. they do market research. women have been taking to the

field, taking to competition, buying firearms for personal protection. i talked to the organizers of a gun show in virginia that do a lot of these east coast gun shows and they keep track of these things. they said five years ago, 8% that attended were women. go to an nra meeting and see how many women were there. that was not the case 20 years ago or 30 years ago. when i finished this presentation -- this was during the summer -- a young lady came up to me. she said, you know, you are absolutely right. she said i'm geomet to school, and she said of my sorority, we all go out to the range and shoot. i looked at her and i said, you know something, 45 years ago at

the university of wisconsin, if i called up his or her to girl and said it is friday afternoon, when we get our gun and go to the range, i don't think gotten that date. [laughter] the world has changed in some ways for the better. we are not going to let a group of ideologues roll back those gains, not now, not ever. [applause] i am here tonight for the same reason you are here tonight, and that is because the people who you organize for and participated in their campaigns and helped knock on doors and provide funds for their campaign believe in these principles. they deserve your support and deserve all of our support. if they did that, we are going to be able to pass on to future generations the nation we inherited from those who came before us. thank you very much.

[applause] >> the unemployment rate today dipped to 7.6%. jobs ins added 88,000 march, the fewest and nine march. it felt because people stopped looking for work. the government counts people areployed only if they looking for a job. this is before the sequestered went into effect -- tonight on c-span networks,

husband and wife documentary producers address disinformation cking.hydraulic frank senator tom coburn, who has represented oklahoma since 2005. and thatritten a book, it's at 8:00 eastern. on c-span3, and look at women's history with scenes and a women's from suffrage parade in washington. that is at 8:00 eastern. predictability in judge bork? what are the assurances where you will be given the

background and history? >> as a teenager, i was a socialist, hardly seems to me to indicate a fundamental instability, because as churchill said, any man who is not a socialist before is 40, 40 haseart, after no head. that kind of evolution is common in people. the einstein of all, bork, and then the einstein of the senate. passing in trains the light. specter was one of the hardest to lobby. bork was a brilliant -- smarter than many people in a lot of ways -- a brilliant judge. he wrote the book. meeting andse guys

they were passing like two trains. they never came together on anything. at 8:00 p.m. t now a senior adviser to president obama valerie jarrett. she spoke wednesday as part of the atlantic's women in washington series. her comments are just under an hour. >> thank you, elizabeth. thank you very much and all of you for being here. thank you, valerie. i will take you a couple of things about her before we get started. full disclosure, we used to work together on the first obama presidential campaign. now i get the chance to ask her all those questions that i always wanted to ask. [laughter] valor is a senior adviser to president obama. she oversees the white house

office of public engagement, an important office to the president. also the head of the council on women and girls. she was the senior official in many capacities in the city of chicago and was the chief executive officer of the habitat company. she is a lawyer and has practice in a couple of law firms. she has gone from law to private business and now to the very top position, one of the very top positions in the white house. one of the most senior roles ever played by any woman in the white house. let's start there with that very issue, which is the -- what everybody is so interested about you, the role you play at the white house. some describe you as the most influential person in the president's staff. you are certainly the most influential person on the staff.

you will probably dispute that, so i would still like to ask you, why do they describe you that way and how do you see your role? >> first of all, i am delighted to be here and see all of you. i am thrilled to be in an audience full of women and a few brave men. [laughter] glad to see you in the front, that is really bold. [laughter] i don't know why people describe the way i am. i think part of the answer is the way you phrased the question. it is unusual to have a woman who is this senior in the administration. you can get more attention when there is historical reference that people can rely on. what i enjoy is the fact that it is 18. -- it is a team. given the state of the world the president inherited, the challenges are huge.

the only way this is going to make the best decisions is to have a diverse group of people who are all thinking together. i don't think there is that kind of a hierarchy. the president listens to people that say things that are interesting. and often, the people that disagree with him. in that sense, we are all equal and you are as good as the last piece of advice you gave him. [laughter] peoplee he listens to who disagree with him, are you someone who was more willing to disagree with him than others because you have such a long friendship? >> i think perhaps in the beginning. as in any situation where people have a new boss, particularly if your boss is the president of the united states, leader of the free world, if you get to know him -- linda had a chance to spend a lot of quality time with him -- the circumstances were quite intimate. you see very quickly how

interested and engaging he is, and he likes people to disagree. toing that sounding board say if you look at it this way or that way, i probably came into the job with a lot of comfort. people who spend time with him appreciate the fact he doesn't want to be pushed. his goal is to make the best possible decisions he can. that comes from listening to a range of opinions, which is part of my response ability in the white house, overseeing the office of public engagement. also the outreach offices that bring perspective to washington that are outside of washington, whether it is the governor, mayor, the state legislature, attorney general, things from outside or whether the range of interest groups that we communicate with on a regular basis and ordinary americans who have thoughts and opinions, too. yourt's talk more about

relationship with the president and also by the office of public engagement and governmental affairs. let's talk about your relationship with the first lady. it is unusual to have somebody at your level in in the white house who has a relationship, personal and professional, with most -- both the president and the first lady. >> she was artie practicing law at a law firm when i met her. it took me six years to figure out -- anybody practicing at a law firm out there? your a matter of finding own passion. i realized early in our career -- our first conversation was about that experience at a law firm and me trying to visit to her the public surface -- service and how she was going to make an enormous difference.

i turned out to be right about her. >> so you started as her boss, and now she's the first lady. talk a little bit about how that relationship even all and what is your role with her in the white house? >> it evolved as many friendships do. i think from the moment i met her, i still remember it was supposed to be about a 20- minute interview. and the moment i met her, i offered her a job on the spot. i should have checked with my boss, the mayor. she struck me as being wise before her years. she was 26 years old. in the middle of the interview, i realized i was no longer interviewing her. she was interviewing me. she was asking good questions to make sure that if she came

in she would add value and make a difference. she just did not want to do public service because it feels good. she wanted to move the needle. she is talking about a second term. she said she wants to make sure that what issues she takes on that she cares about them. that they will last longer than just my husband's term. those are the same issues she talked about with me 23 years ago. usedse her chief of staff to be the head of the office of public engagement, we work closely together. it was maybe unprecedented in

the white house. hadntimes the first lady her own agenda that was not part of the president's agenda. this first lady wants to have a passion and be someone who will be helpful to her husband. we spent a lot of time collaborating. in addition to being friends. >> you are friends. you read the criticism that the inner circle is too small and does not change often and the president should reach out more. he should bring in more outside people to work in government or socialize with congress more. do you try to get him to reach out more? do you think it has been an issue because there has been a

charm offensive in congress where he has been spending more time with them. have you encouraged him? >> he has always reached out. he has been engaging. part of the skill that he brought to the white house was what i observed in him when he was in the state legislator in illinois as a junior senator. he reached across the aisle and found a common ground. in the first term, he found there was not a lot of reciprocity on the part of the republicans in congress to engage. that has changed since the election. you can take issues such as immigration reform. he tried to get engagement, especially since under president bush, the president and republicans cosponsored a bill but when president obama came in, that enthusiasm

vanished. he reached out on the beginning. they did not want to engage. now there is a willingness to engage area evil increased that outreach. he will do whatever it takes to get the job done. in terms of the lighthouse, we have had transition. there have been a lot of people -- in terms of the white house, we have had transition. have a new perspective is energizing. having denis mcdonough as the official is helpful. the president appreciates the fresh perspective.

>> because you have weighed in on so many issues, you read those who may be envious about that access you have saved that is primarily because you are friends. how do you react when you hear that? >> it is insulting. there is assumption there. he did not need me to come in. his senior advisers provide him with advice. likey colleagues, i would to think they think i add value and for the people that are outside, may be it is an enigma. they may say it is probably because the woman is his friend. [laughter] what is really important is how

he feels about his team and that he gets what he needs. ofhas an energized group people who are encouraged to speak openly and challenge him and ourselves. it makes for a healthy environment. i have had a lot of bosses. to go from being a mentor and his spouse's boss to seeing this role reversal, i thought how will that work? i am used to being the bully. it has been amazing. >> starting with the issue -- the office of public engagement and intergovernmental affairs in the council on woman and girls. they are not known. what do you see as the greatest accomplishment that you have

been able to achieve with those divisions. >> the point is to encourage people who are out there where the rubber meets the roads, mayors to give us their perspective and tell us how well we are doing affects their lives. there is a range of constituencies who are deeply affected by the decisions made in washington. our goal is to wake up and think about them. think about the american people and their challenges and the opportunities we want to create for them. he has said in the first couple of years he worked so hard on getting the policy right that we did not half as much time available for the engagement and bringing in fresh ideas and getting outside of washington and having that serendipitous encounter on a rope line were

someone tells you a story about what you are doing and how it affects them. that is invigorating. what we have found is our successes are vast when americans have the wind to its back. that happened before the election. think about the payroll tax break we were able to get through congress. there was resistance until we traveled around the country and talked about it. the same when the interest rates on the student loans were about to double. we got a lot of young people interested. that helps make the case to congress for why we were proposing was so important. we look forward to doing more of that in the second term. >> you have been a liaison to the business community. they were not complimentary of the president's first term. many of them supported romney.

what would happen there? >> you have to remember what we were going through when the president took office. the economy was in crisis. the stock market was in a freefall. the world economy was teetering on the brink the cause of what was going on in the u.s. the president had to make tough and often unpopular decisions to continue the bailout of the banks that president bush started and help the auto industry. push through the recovery act so we did not continue the freefall. put in place rules to ensure we were never in a situation where taxpayers have to provide the subsidies they did to the banks.

that was contentious with the business community. you had a disconnect where the world had collapsed and some of it continued with business as usual with the bonuses, etc. while american people were losing their homes and jobs. we lost 4 million jobs in the last six months of 2008. 750,000 jobs the first month the president took office. that sent shockwaves. by nature of the circumstances, there would be some tension. some in the business community wanted us to not move forward with dodd-frank. some wanted us to reinstitute the repatriation holiday. there were basic policy disagreements. some of it was toned. some of it was the rhetoric you

were hearing on both sides. times were tense. people have a lot at stake. the president worked hard to right the ship. that ruffled feathers. four years in, our interests are more aligned. we worked closely with the business community to get their free trade agreements to south korea, panama, colombia. we are working for additional free-trade agreements. we did a lot for the travel in tourism industry to expedite visas that were taking too long. we heard complaints about people standing in line for hours or traveling miles to get a visa to come to the united states. we string lines that process. look at the segments of the business community. it is not homogeneous.

that is something we are working on closely with the business community. at the funny till of last year, just at the end of the last year, the fiscal community engaged with the president in a way that they did not what we face the crisis in 2011 when the debt ceiling was looming. i was a wake-up call for both of us. we could not just assume that congress would avoid defaulting on our full faith and credit. the business community realized they should help congress what was at stake. ofhave an alignment interests. i am not going to say we will always agree but despite tensions you may have heard of or whoever anyone supported in the presidential race, the president has always had an open door.

within the week after the election, the president invited in a cross-section of business leaders and asked for help as we face the fiscal cliff and the sequester and debt ceiling. that opened the door and provided opportunities for us to work together. >> another issue area in which you were involved -- the gay and lesbian community. you have been an advocate of same-sex marriage for a longer time than the president. can you tell us about your conversations with him on that issue and how his thinking evolved? he did come around. >> i have been a supporter of

same-sex marriage. i have a 27-year-old daughter. allcannot figure out what the fuss is about. a conversation that i have been having with her has been going on longer than the president's conversation with his daughters. he talked about how he made this evolution and it had a lot to do with his daughters who were in school with children whose parents were same-sex parents. he could not figure how do i say that your friends' parents cannot marry when other friends' parents can marry. his experience with people in the administration and friends of his who have had long- lasting relationships and want to marry. byhad an evolution driven his children and the relationships that he has as opposed to anything i would say. i've respected his evolution.

he never questioned my position. >> you talked about it? >> we always did. i am a sounding board for him. he does not worry that i will come here and disclose all of the details of his conversation. [laughter] >> we will keep trying. [laughter] longer issue is that you advocated the idea of people who came to this country illegally as children should be allowed to stay. >> the dream act kids. i can tell you where that came about. three years ago, a group of

young adults walked to washington from florida. literally walked. they asked for a meeting with the president. because they were here without authorization, they could not come into the white house. thet with them outside of white house together with the president of -- when you hear stories of them growing up, and you can imagine the shock of growing up in this country -- they wanted to be teachers or serve in the military. they loved their country. when you heard the stories, you could not help but foster them. i met with them three or four times. they kept saying we want the

president to recognize and do everything within his power. our first choice was to get legislation passed. that is the way to have a permit path to citizenship. there was nothing he could do that would give them that. we did not want to take the pressure off of congress from passing a comprehensive package. when it was clear that they would not do so, the president did sign the executive order. it is a stopgap measure which why we are working for a permit solution.t there is a chance we could get it. i was a big advocate for those young people. you meet them and you can see my daughter. their commitment and love for our country was no greater than hers.

>> did that take a lot of persuading? >> he was always a supporter. the president and i agree on our vision on the country, our philosophy on growing the economy, equality and equal rights. we realize we shared those the first time we had dinner 23 years ago. as part of the bond of our friendships. ofdoes not need a lot persuasion from me to care about the same issues i care about. he already cares. i was delighted with his inauguration address. it captured as only he can the essence of what he things our country is about. you are bending the ark of the moral universe toward justice. thatis a work in progress

is never complete. he does not take a lot of convincing. >> the final issue and then we want to talk about being a woman in a man's world -- another front-page issue is gun violence. haveis something that you talked about a lot and cared about a lot because of the gun violence in chicago. nowdo you think this has moved so slowly to the point where it looks like nothing will be done at all? >> there were a lot of questions. it was an opportunity to strike when the iron was hot. what happened? >> i am not as pessimistic as the way you phrase the question would indicate.

i had breakfast with the president to talk about what more we could do. the president is on his way to colorado to do an event to keep the passion going. at the white house, we had a powerful meeting and session with the mothers of victims who sit behind the president. i was looking at their expressions while the president was talking. this is an issue where i do not think that there is a mother out there that does not feel for these children. i went to newtown with the president two days after the tragedy. i was in his office one john brennan called to tell him how many children were killed. i sat in the car with him while he wrote his speech that he gave that night. his staff prepared a speech, but he said they did not capture what he wanted to say.

he was trying to figure out what to say that can console these parents. i watched him as he walked from family to family and tried to comfort him. -- them. i went to chicago with the first lady for a young lady's funeral. i know their family. once you have seen the devastation that so many families have undergone, we will not be deterred. we knew it would be hard. we will keep pushing. i am confident we will get legislation passed. the president has taken 23 executive actions. we will do anything within our power. passed seeing states laws. there is a lot we can do.

if we can save one child, i do not want to go to anymore funerals like the young lady's funeral. we should not give up. i will not give up. there is not a day that i go by that i do not think about the families i met. we are motivated. they are not pessimistic. we may not get everything we set out to do immediately but we will make progress. >> do you think that the nra was more formidable than you expected? >> this is an issue that people care about passionately. when you look at the polling, you see 90% of the country is in favor of your russell background checks. there is a sense that the -- 90% of the country is in favor of universal background checks. it is healthy to the process. we can respect the second amendment and protect the

rights of lawful gun owners. who can argue that you do not want someone with a criminal background or mental elements having a gun? theseou should have magazines with infinite number of capacity to shoot the lives. i have met with a young man who was in aurora who was shot several times. he survived. he was on to way being a fulbright scholar but he now wants to be an advocate to stop violence. you meet amazing people. that is what motivates us to do more. i do not think this will take nearly as long as what the example i will give you. the president gave me a present. one was a petition for suffrage signed back in 1866 by susan b anthony and all of these amazing women.

and the final resolution of congress in 1919. over 50 years it took to get this done. think about the people who signed the petition who were not there when the resolution was signed. they had to pass the baton. change is hard. you know that. we have not given up hope. change is hard but you have to keep at it. when it comes to issues like comprehensive immigration reform or gun control, the sand shifts quickly. after the devastation we have seen in the last couple of years, i would think that would be enough. it is enough for americans. we have to help congress catch up. >> on what issue do you think you have had the most influence? >> i am not answering that question. [laughter]

part of it is because everything is collaborative. we have conversations in the white house. we talk to one another. some of the work you did on the affordable care act. you remember the meetings. could you say that one person in the room was the driving force? you may pick one person. aat person would say it was team of people. i take pride in being a part of the team. part of the reason is why the team works is you do not want people saying i did that. it is about us helping the president make decisions. the one thing i can say about his senior staff is our job is to provide him with the range of choices, give him our best thinking, and have confidence he will make the right

decisions. he says when will you bring me that easy issue? [laughter] you have come in here with 10 things that are hard. if it was that easy, we would have decided. the ones that are between a bad choice and a worse choice are where you come in. [laughter] that is what our job is. it is not an administration where you will find anyone saying i did that. our goal is to make sure he makes the best judgment. we trust his judgment. >> in the five years you have been there, with every problem in the world facing you and a new presidency and a team that had not been in the white house before, what do you think is the most important thing you have learned in these five years? what do you think you do

differently today than you did when you started? >> that is a good question. we are in a different place. there is not a day that goes by that i have not learned a lesson that is very important. ie of the lessons that learned working for city government that i had to relearn at the federal level because this was like drinking out of a water hose is that you have so much coming in at you. you often cannot lose sight of the focus. how do you get things done? by continuing to nudge along. it turned out to be harder than we anticipated in terms of accomplishments that requires congress as a partner. you cannot give up.

you have to be determined and resilience. you have to be focused and push. you have to try a lot of different things. you have to have a certain decency about you that there are some things you will not do to get what you want. all of those things that you learn from your parents or in kindergarten, that sense of team play are important. the resilience and not sweating the small stuff. this is a tough town. you know that. you work here. coming from chicago, i grew up in chicago politics. chicago is child's play next to

d.c. this place will break your heart if you let it. you have to let things roll off. people say things that are not true. you cannot spend your nights anguishing about that. you have to remember why you are here and if you get out of washington and travel around and meet some of these people who have been touched by the good things we have gotten done, that is what consoles you for some of the tough times you face. a tough skin is important. try to keep a good heart. woman we get to being a in the man's world. start with the white house. it has been said that it is a boys club. is that true? have you done anything yourself to mitigate any of that or change that impression or

reality? >> it is not true. i was in a senior staff meeting. something told me when did they bring the subject up. the people who were contributing this morning were one of the president's deputy chiefs of staff. she gave a presentation on the sequester. there is the white house counsel who will not make a move without consulting with the deputy chief of staff or the cabinet secretary. one of the goals for the second term is to make sure the cabinet is integrated into the decision-making progress. i could go on with this thing your tame the president has surrounded himself with. then there is the cabinet. you saw the janet a. napolitano, who was named the secret service.

i give these examples -- when we talk about the president's second term, he has a robust legislative agenda. the one thing he has made clear is that just as important as new legislation is busy successful implementation of the affordable care act. that is in the hands of kathleen sebelius, the women on the supreme court. he has always surrounded himself just by women but women who he empowered in positions of influence. when people say it is a boys club, it is insulting to the women who are playing vertical worlds.

critical roles. you may not see them on television, but they play critical roles. you should not underestimate the impact they have on the administration. >> talk about your life as a woman in a man's world outside of the white house. coming through the private sector, chicago city politics, which looks like it requires big muscles, you are a woman, african-american woman, and a single mom. do you have a story you can share with us about what you may have had to just taken a deep breath and said, really? that moment that you may have experienced where you were moving up from one powerful position to another. mythe moment that changed life was having a child. i was on a trajectory. i was working at a law firm. i was the first woman in my family to be a lawyer.

my parents were proud. i had a beautiful office in the sears tower in chicago. when i returned from maternity leave, i was sitting in my office and i cried. i was miserable. i was not doing anything that i thought my daughter would be proud of one day. i had no passion. i would not say i was the best at it. joining city government is a change in trajectory, which allowed me flexibility. weres not that my hours less. i have flexibility about when i worked. i made a priority of being home for my daughter before she would go to bed. i would work after she went to bed. i have the ability to juggle. i had a woman who was my mentor. as madeleine albright said, there is a special place in hell for women who do not help

other women. go mentor encouraged me to and after about a year of working hard and ask for a promotion. my boss was a man. my mentor pushed me. i was a single mom. she said you are doing the same job as somebody who is a deputy. you should have the title and everything that goes with it. you should have the salary. did she set it to me and i not do it, she was dogged. one day i went into my boss's office and made my case. she said tell him why. i thought that he would recognize my worth.

he listened to me and said ok. i was like what? i said oh and i want that office next to yours. [laughter] he said you cannot have that office. it is hierarchy based on longevity. i said but do not have a woman there. it will look better -- he said no. but i moved in. [laughter] my second story is why the mayor will always have my heart. i moved from the mayor's office to running the office of planning and development. i was in a meeting with him with on of his officials. susan and i were in a meeting.

he is really intimidating. he was going on about something. we were paying no attention. we kept looking at our watches. he realizes we were not listening. he says would you like to explain to me what is so important that you are not paying attention? paradethe halloween starts in 20 minutes. it is 25 minutes away. he said when are you doing here? if you cannot imagine the relief we felt. here he is the mayor of the city saying go to the halloween parade. we rushed and got out of the car just as the children were looking in the audience to see if we were there.

we were talking about can you have it all and the controversy going around with sheryl sandberg's book. you can have it all but you cannot have it all at the same time. you have two workplaces that respect your whole life. people go to work and pretend they are somebody they are not. they think that is what it takes to get ahead. you may get ahead but you will not be fulfilled. pick your boss as well. be honest with yourself about what you need. if i had a five-year-old, i cannot work in the white house. when my daughter was five, i get to be home to tucker in bed. every once children are not the same you have to listen to yourself. you have to trust your gut. trade- there will be offs.

you may not he able to work in the west wing when you are 30 but when you are 56 and the children are grown and you are not married, it is a great place to work. [laughter] it is delightful. be honest with yourself. i was fortunate to work in institutions that supported my life choices and allowed me to have a whole life. that is important. >> that is a great way to close. you were instrumental in helping to elect the first african-american president. hillary clinton is top of line because she was on stage last night. will we see the first woman president in our lifetime? >> we should try to make

opportunities available that have not been historically available. you talked about my position in the white house. >> advising hillary clinton? >> it is the beginning of 2013. why are we talking about the next president? can we get this president more time to be president? the day after the election you are on to the next race. [laughter] give everyone a chance to figure out what they want to do. the idea breaking these glass ceilings and making sure we have more women in congress, perhaps we would have an easier time. women are good in elected

office. it is regrettable more women do not go into elected office as well as pursue careers in government. if we can get a critical mass in the elective body, good things are ahead. >> that was great. thank you so much for that. if anyone has questions, we have a microphone. raise your hand and identify yourself. the first question comes from a man. >> i am steve. i work in the city and study as well. thank you, linda. a lot of us have basketball on the mind. almah your law school mater georgetown good luck.

give your views on the flap of what happened to avery richards. she attended a conference in california. some people behind her made vulgar remarks. they were fired afterward. then she got a lot of threats. when i was a kid i devoured a book by evan thomas, what would be the female analog to them in

your opinion? >> in terms of behavior in the workplace and in general, we are obligated to set high standards for what is appropriate conduct. everyone in here has had a man or woman say something inappropriate to you and the work is that was compromising. many of us shrug it off because that is part of -- you are used to it. it is not ok. i remember being young and having client state things that were inappropriate. part of what we tried to do back then was be with the team. you do not want to look like

that woman who cannot take a joke. it is ok to say you cannot talk like that. it is not acceptable. we should stand up for ourselves and each other. if you see somebody who is getting spoken to in an inappropriate way, do it for them. you can be firm and clear. encourage our daughters to do that. our daughters do not need as much help as we did. they are good at fending for themselves. you have to be vigilant. i spent a lot of time with victims of domestic violence, of human trafficking and you would think in our country that

it would not be the way it is. one of the most underreported crimes is sexual assault on a partner. theere able to pass reauthorization of the violence against women act. it's ok. you can clap. kathleen biden is on the board of a service that provides services to victims of violence and helps with everything from getting protection orders to divorce and child custody. 800 lawyers in d.c. volunteered to do this. it is an amazing project. it brought to home how important the laws are but they will only be as good as the reporting mechanisms and the poor systems women have. one in three women is a victim. this is not someone else's problem is ours.

>> another question. jill. >> jill lawrence from "national journal." one of the priorities is implementing the national care act. there have been articles about business is having problems -- that are small and would grow and are waiting to see what happens but may not decide to grow because it may be too onerous. do they have legitimate complaints? what does the white house plan for dealing with the glitches that will happen as this is implemented? >> there is a piece of legislation. there will be glitches at the white house and through kathleen sebelius' office. we are working with the business community and trying to figure out if there are

consequences, how we can address them. the successful implementation will be challenging. that is why we are spending so much time planning and reaching out. one example -- we had a meeting with folks from the pharmacy industry. pharmacists are trusted. they will be on the front line. one of our responsibilities will be setting up exchanges around the states and the federal exchanges and getting the enrollment going. a lot of the people who we want to be the beneficiaries of the enrollments may not know what they have to do to get enrolled. figuring out creative ways of marketing those exchanges is something we are engaged in and a lot of dialogs. will be a grassroots effort to register people to make sure they have access to the benefits. ofs will improve the health

our country. we will offer affordable healthcare to everyone. it does not mean that it will be without challenges. for small businesses, we have an aggressive outreach to them to make sure they understand what the requirements are, what theirtential benefits to employees would be, and overall we are convinced it is good for the country but there will be an intensive outreach effort to the white house and through hhs. we want to make sure we address this. >> i am from the state department.

>> i am margo carrington. it was useful to hear what you said but i was struck in 2010 when the white house held a focus on accountability. with the yahoo! decision and other challenges, are there plans to move forward? >> yes, it is. it is interesting. at the time we did the forum on workplace flexibility -- both the president and firesst lady were involved. when the first lady was interviewing for a job was when sasha was a baby. she called and said the babysitte rhas not shown up. she said she would take her with

me. would be if anybody willing to bring a baby -- it is him. the first lady got the job and mike said, i had good judgment in hiring her. what is important is we did a study demonstrating that companies with flexibility have the greater flexibility and profitability. with families and communities -- it is good for business. one thing we explored through the council. both in the federal governments -- we have companies doing

amazing things with the federal government, too. look at the needs of your own business. they may decide if they want to go into work, or if that is a culture they want to put in place and other company may want to have more creative ways for flexibility. part of our job is to highlight those options and to use the white house as a way where people can see the options and highlight them, in the hopes of getting this conversation going and more and more companies are preaching this business model and why it is so important. >> i know that you have to get back to the white house. >> this is so much fun. >> it is more fun than what you are doing now.

>> i think that you are ok. thank you so much. >> thank you all for coming. saysce president joe biden the u.s. needs an ambitious agenda to make american products competitive overseas. ofspoke before a conference the export import bank, here is a portion of what he had to say. >> i have overwhelming confidence on the competitive capacity of the american worker. they are the most productive workers in the world today. but we will not fully realize our potential if the game is rigged, and there is a lot of ribbing going on right now. that is why we're troubled by

state-owned national champion competitors, that enjoys subsidized financing, cheap imports are up -- artificially inflating their competitors, restricting trade designed to induce american companies to train to their technology and their manufacturing as the condition of market access, and procurement rules that keep american companies from the chance to compete and governments who still intellectual property to benefit favored companies, and increasingly we see a wholesale theft of confidential business information and proprietary technologies through cyber- intrusion and this has to stop. >> to stay competitive he said the u.s. has to reform the immigration system and maintain their presence as a specific power and invests in -- invest

in infrastructure. you can see his comments on line at c-span.org. husband andnight, wife document to producers talk about their film addressing the misinformation about the process of hydraulic fracturing for natural gas. after we open the phone lines to get your reaction. representedas oklahoma since 2005 and plans to retire after his current term. that is at o'clock eastern. a look at women's history on c- span 3, with interviews from a cent -- centennial celebration of the 1913 women's suffrage parade. >> they had a very political marriage, much like john and

abigail. in the halls of congress and she was careful to say, my husband believes this doing she, herself, was the pitch and one of her husband's opponents said, the hope that if james were ever elected president, she would take up housekeeping like a normal woman. and she said, if james and i are elected, i will not keep house nor make butter. >> one of the most influential first lady's -- and we will look at her successor. and we will take your questions facebooknts by phone, and sweater. -- twitter. thsi morning, we talked with the

soon-to-be-head of the southern baptist convention. this is 45 minutes. host: he is with the president -- he is with the southern baptist commission. good morning for be here. let us start up with the basics. but as the southern baptist convention and how does your role relate to it? guest: it is the nation's largest non catholic denominations. they have over 40,000 churches. my role as president of the ethics and religious liberty commission is twofold. we speak to baptist christian about moral and public policy.

and then we speak for churches in the public square in the political arena. backgroundave a looking -- background working on politics. guest: i started as an intern for congressman taylor. great memories. host: what you see as the role religion should play in politics? guest: religion deals with ultimate matters, what the and what it is -- how we world. behink religious people must involved in public policy matters because as citizens we have a responsibility to care for the good of our neighbor, to maintain the common good of the nation. i think the nation has an interest in seeing to it that religious believers are involved in the process. after all what religion teaches us and shows is that the state is an ultimate, the culture is an ultimate, there are alternate priorities beyond those things.

when we come as christians or muslims or choose -- or jews, we are speaking to one another to oppress one another or to -- not to oppress one another to persuade them that it is the sake of the common good. host: how does the ethics and liberty commission make recommendations? how do you determine what methods you share with both of the met this convention and the general public? guest: a variety of ways. southern baptists gather once a year in an open and free democratic process where southern baptist begun various issues we are concerned about. -- speak on various issues we are concerned about. that helps to form a consensus. and then to speak to one another, calling churches to give attention to things that we have not given attention to in the past. host: we see this piece --

it is no coincidence that the marriage, and control, and immigration are all in the news this month. the prominence measures a critical political shift: indus culture wars, the offense and defense have switched sides. what issues do advocate for their losing in the polls? guest: i do not like to think in terms of culture wars. we are not at war with one another. we have very deep disagreements on issues that matter. but i think we come to that with civility and in conversation. i do think as the tentacles we need to recognize that we are not speaking as majoritarian. we are not standing and saying everything we are concerned about is by necessity with the entire country agrees with us. we are omitting issues that -- let's think about what it is you are bypassing.

withhas been the case evangelical christians and with baptists particularly come all the way back to the founding -- founding republic that the. seem to be a priority for many people. host: the percentage of people who pulled in favor of same-sex marriage, you can see how it breaks down on religious lines. unaffiliated, 77% favor it. you could see other groups in the middle. catholics, 48%. how do you hope the supreme court rules on the gay marriage issue we saw argued last month? we are looking at proposition 8, the defense of marriage act. guest: i hope the supreme court allows this conversation to go on in american society. i believe that marriage is a

conjugal union between a man and a woman. but i think that is the kind of debate we need to have within american society, what is marriage? how what we understand this definition? because i believe the state does not define marriage, it merely recognizes something that already exists. i hope the supreme court will recognize the goodness of that ongoing debate in american society and as you circuit. also recognizing that the government has in interest in providing a definition and maintaining for the protection of children and families and future generations marriage. court that the supreme will take a prudent -- you: here is a piece

offered a couple of years ago -- how do you believe the issue of immigration should be handled right now? guest: i think we need to recognize that those who have emigrated to this country are persons created in the image of god. they ought to be loved and respected. the kind of language we use in this debate ought to recognize that. the terms of direction towards immigrant communities, words

like anchor-baby, i think are de-humanizing. we ought to be standing for our neighbors who have emigrated to this country and say these are not things, these are persons. i also think we ought to welcome the kind of growing concensus that is happening on both the left and right. few people believe we are goign to deport 12 million people. what is the just way to move people out of the shadows and into the fullness of american life? i really think we are moving closer to one another on those questions. with if you like to speak dr. russell moore, here are the numbers. our first caller is alfred in maine, of republicans lined --

democrats line, good morning. caller: i want to bring to light the legislation that is on floor of the state legislature in north carolina, about declaring a state religion. i think the religious law right are engaged in a war against rest of the country or believers." they want this to be a theocracy. they are working towards this country being a theocracy to rid -- theocracy. people in the military are coerced to either be religious or express their religiosity or

be subjected to discrimination within the military. religion has no business in politics. this man, from a religious point of view, has nothing to say about who gets married. host: let us get a response. guest: first of all, the last thing we want as evangelical christians is a theocracy. we believe as christians that people are reconciled to god through the power of the spirit and the proclamation of the word not reaction of the state. -- not through the action of the state. having state and forced religion would not moving towards the gospel. that would make religion the equivalent of a driver's license. we are religious -- we are for freedom of conscience, religious liberty, where we can have the playground to seek to persuade one another about those things

we believe our ultimate values. i am able to speak to my neighbor about the gospel and the christian message and my neighbor is able to talk to me about secular progressive values for about buddhist understandings of reality. that i am able to speak to my neighbor about the value of the bible and my neighbor is able to talk to me about secular values or buddhist understanding of the bible. that does not mean we do not bring our sense of what is important into the public square. we all do. we bring our perspective of marriage. we do not claim every relationship to be marital. there is a reason why the state has an interest in marriage. that is highly -- hardly theocratic. no one in the military believes in coercing anyone. what we want is for our chaplains to be able to practice and empower those servicemen and women to be able religious beliefs

freely. that means muslim chaplains being free to be muslims, catholic chaplains and evangelical kaplan -- chaplains, and with everything that means. that is not a theocracy. that is religious liberty. host: florida. david, independent line. seek out mr. moore -- seco vista more, you talked about immigrants. is the southern baptist convention not a very wealthy convention? guest: we would largely be a lower or middle class convention. seco -- six months ago did you not have someone have to step

down because they stole money? guest: no. caller: my comment is if you have an attitude like that, who is going to feed those people. " because we have enough financial problems in this country in my closing argument is if we stop complaining and we start doing something about it, and so start changing in this country. host: all right, david. but get a response here it guest: many -- let's get a response. guest: many of the immigrants are not coming to this country to take, but get a better future for their children. of course, the children -- the church needs to be on the front

lines of ministry to all of those that are impoverished and vulnerable, putting immigrants in our communities, and that is what churches are doing. go to an evangelical church and are a roman catholic church, and you will probably find a ministry taking place at the front line with immigrant communities being welcomed into the country and helping them to get their feet on the ground. i think that is already taking place. what we should not do is see immigrant communities in the way that your question would imply as takers. we should see what these immigrant communities can bring to this country and how we can help to give them a step ahead. host: let's look at american perspectives on how illegal

immigrants should be dealt with. we recently saw evangelical groups calling for what they say should be a clear path to citizenship. guest: i support a path to citizenship and i think those numbers bear out a growing consensus that says we actually agree more than we disagree. nobody is for totally open borders. we must have border security. nobody is saying we ought to have the kind of police force that would come in and deport 12 million people. what is the alternative? how do we just we, fairly and humanely help people to become continued in parts of the society and have the kind of future they came here looking for. many of them are holding two american values and our christians, i would add. there is a question of what is the path to citizenship mean. we want them to move forward with us as a country.

host: how do we talk to republicans who do not agree with you -- senator ted cruz and others who are self- professed christians. how do you speak with them about this issue? guest: most people on either side of the issue had valid and legitimate concerns. some that are fearful or concerned about a path to citizenship are arguing what we do not want to do is somehow penalize people who have played by the rules and have come here and we also do not want to tear down the rule of law. beenld argue we have giving mixed messages in this country to immigrants all along

and my predecessor as president of the ethics and religious liberty commission has said that our message at the border has been simultaneously keep out and help wanted. i think that is true. since that is the case, we need to find a way to take the next step. the concern is valid at the front end but i do not think ultimately it is workable. host: russell moore is our guest. he is the president of the southern baptist convention. he mentioned his predecessor, richard land leaving that position. you are 41 years old. what does it mean to have a young person in this position? guest: i am not sure 41 is young. host: compared to 66 it is. guest: i think what is happening is there is a connection of generations. some of the generational

fragmentation we have seen in our churches is starting to be resolved. young people are active and vibrant within evangelical life. we also have a great tradition. i hope to be a bridge between the younger baptist christians and older generations. host: albert) -- albert on the republican line. caller: there really is a war you have to wage and it is that the secular left is trying to turn this country totally around. there were is against christianity, any form of it. havedo it in our schools, tried to take away the values this country was started on. what infuriates me is i see no

christians trying to involve themselves in the secular left and how they approach their religion. it is in schools, work, every phase of american life. in rhode island here we have a statue up that said god bless veterans that died in world war ii and we had to take it down. we have to get these judges to stop these decisions. there is a work the secular left is waging against the christian society in this country. host: let's leave it there albert and get a response. guest: where i would agree is there is an understanding that having separation of church and state means one must have a secularizing influence that marginalizes the voices of religious people and people of faith. obviously as a christian and as an american i do not believe

that is the way to go. you need to not silence voices but in power voices so that we have more conversation including about those things of ultimate importance, the faith that animates us, and had disagreements about those things. i would agree with him that there is often a misunderstanding of religious liberty and separation of church and state that leads to some really serious threats to religious liberty in this country that i think we ought to be concerned about in the future. sometimes the debates we have in terms of how we frame this as a war on us are less than helpful, but i do think it is an important conversation. host: caller right here in washington, d.c. ew is a democrat. caller: thank you for taking my call. i think this man pots voice is important in the discussion. any of us have not developed a

true position. i am still grappling with the idea of not forcing anyone to be like i am. my ministry and one part of my ministry is a way to compel people by the way i live him id if that happens to be what say, it is one thing, more importantly by the way i live. if they choose to take that way of life, that is what we are called to do. civil rights, i think people should have the choice to choose. host: are you talking about gay marriage? caller: i am talking about any aspect of life. including gay marriage. i am not for gay marriage, but i do not want to force my beliefs on anyone, just as anyone who chooses to be an atheist, it is not my right to make it legally where they have to become a rich and. i -- a christian. i, like many people, are going

in that direction. we cannot force anyone to be what we are. by the same token, i do also believe that those that are not in agreement with them do not have the total right to define something like marriage already exists between a man and a woman. host: a quick question before we let you go -- how much does your religious faith increase -- influence your vote and your politics? caller: it does impact it had to what degree, -- impact it. to what degree, i am still growing, and i cannot give you a number. guest: i agree that nobody wants to course people to hold believes -- believes they do not hold her at the with saying that is -- hold. the problem with saying that,

for instance on the marriage question, both sides argue that marriage is important in the state has to address the question of marriage. we both agree on that. we simply disagree on what the definition of marriage is. thee cannot simply say state is going to ignore this and be totally neutral on the question of marriage as the state has an interest in marriage. what i would say is why is the state interested in marriage and i would say there is something unique about the between a man and a woman that is different from other relationships and congress has an interest in that because of the harm that can be done to children and families in future generations. we should not coerce each other, but that hardly takes all the issues off the table. host: a recent poll asked people whether they thought the

legality of same-sex marriage should be based on the constitution or individual laws in each state. what does that say to you? guest: i think you have a lot of conflicting visions what it comes to the question of marriage right now. how are we going to frame the discussion? of sides recognize it is a complicated matter if you are going state-by-state. what happens to someone that is married in one state and not married in another state -- that was the intent behind the defense of marriage act before the supreme court. in terms of the federal government, we are going to recognize a certain definition of marriage and i believe the state has an interest in man- woman, conjugal marriage. that is in no way a hostility toward neighbors that are living lies in other ways. that is sadly to say this is a

unique relationship the state has an interest in -- solely to say this is a unique relationship the state has a interest in. host: carl, ohio. caller: i must be getting old because 20 years ago we would not be talking about these issues -- lawbreakers raking the law, gays getting married -- family values are out the door. they are gone for good. i am scared because the liberals have really ruined this country and the republicans have not helped much. they have made things worse. we are not talking about jobs.g we are talking about getting rid of social security and medicare. i do not believe how much we have changed in this country.

thank you. guest: i agree with carl that we have had some sudden changes. consider the same-sex marriage argument. this conversation has changed dramatically since 2004 and even in the last month or two. that is one reason why social conservatives would say that we ought not to have radical changes on the basis of this cultural moment. if you have something as important as marriage historically and culturally we ought to protect and conserve it. host: a question from twitter, jonathan writes what will be the position on fiscal issues? guest: christians disagree on what particular fiscal and economic policies ought to be, so you will not see a specific policy on what next year's budget ought to look like from elrc, for instance. we should have the values that shape the way we see economics and hours spent ability to live

within our means and to provide people with the ability to provide for their families and children but we will not be in a position that assigns bible verses to everything. host: our guest is the president elect of elrc, who will start in the job june 1. florida. angie. caller: good morning. it is great to hear your voice and stand up to the christian belief. i think everyone has the opportunity to make their own choices, but i think our country was founded on the principles of the bible. i do not think redefining what things are is good. marriage is marriage.

he created man and woman from man. i think the last three colors that you had -- callers that you had expressed a great deal of concern. as christians, he did not want to see our country fall by the wayside -- we do not want to see our country fall by the wayside. we have financial problems. i am praying for you as a leader and a speaker that as you get up in front of people and you speak the word of what is true that people understand you are just trying to present the gospel in a way that i think we should stand up for what is christians. thank you for taking this time to do that this morning. guest: thank you, angie. one of the things that is important for christian

believers such as myself and for all people is to see what we are dealing with ultimately is an optimistic scenario, not a pessimistic scenario. the situations we face are important and in many cases direct, and the consequences are crucial, but if we really believe that jesus has said about the kingdom of god and the ongoing march of the gospel in history than we do not come to this as losers or people who are frantic or outraged. he come with a quiet confidence. we speak to our neighbors and seeks to do what is right, opposing evil in whatever form that is. we do not do that as people who are terrified. we do that as people who are confident in the power of the gospel era -- gospel. host: russell moore, former presidential candidate mike huckabee has talked about residential candidates being moderate for evangelical. he said in the last individual presidential elections --

should candidates be tracking further to the right in terms of social values? guest: i do not think the question is right or moderate. it is due these candidates care about the -- it is do these candidates care about the issues important to evangelicals and christians. having a candidate who really believes and articulates a position of protecting the unborn and the way that connects to every other aspect of the way we deal with each other as human persons, that is something that has been missing for a long time. you have some evangelicals that

feel they are simply taken for granted as an interest group. i think the answer to that is not for one party or the other to co-opt evangelical christians as an interest group. i think what has to happen is we have to make a compelling case for the importance of these issues and long for candidates that will be willing to not only listen to that, but also to articulate that vision of human life. host: what does it take for the ethics and religious liberty commission at the southern baptists to sanctify a candidate and say they support them, for example on abortion issues. does the candidate need to be polite to the extent that they believe abortion should not happen in the case of rape or incest? guest: we do not endorse candidates. we deal with issues. we say to christians and

churches that these are the questions on the table and what we believe we have a priority to be concerned about -- the life of the unborn and a whole list of issues. also, speaking to policy makers to say are the things christians are concerned about and this is why. the pro-life issue is not a generational blip. it is something increasing. the next generation have the concern that we communicate that to elected officials and others but we do not endorse candidates. host: massachusetts. susan is a democrat. guest: good morning. my comment is about the bill of rights. when they mention the freedom of religion, it seems like the gun part -- they never focus on that second part. the first part is freedom of religion, and the second part is there should be no law that the government could make that would prohibit the free exercise of that religion.

i think sometimes this separation of church and state, which is offputting to some, is not really mentioned anywhere in the constitution and they start to get overboard on not allowing, say about a christian group --, -- say, a christian group, having an area in the school to meet, or children in school talk about christmas or hanukkah and explain to other kids what that is all about. i think tolerance and the more children know about each other and their faith and in their ethnic backgrounds, it makes a better melting pot for country.

the other thing that i wanted to mention on the abortion issue, it is tough when government gets involved in those issues. because it initially women were doing horrible things to themselves to abort their children, and then they said well, they should get hospital care. then, it went overboard. now, abortion, for any reason, is supposed to be fine. i think most people feel that abortion is not right, but i think it is also between a person and god. he is the one that reads the heart of the person and makes the decision. we can say that it is outlawed or that it is fine, but either way it ends up being between the person and god.

guest: except that there are italy will persons involved, -- that there are two persons involved. thisetus, the embryo, is in fact a person? if so, then we hardly could say about any other person that that person's right to life is dependent upon someone else and that person's relationship with god or his doctor. we would say that person has an inalienable right to life that is rooted in the image of god. life is not meaningful simply because of one's utility or wanted this. i human life is precious and worthy of protecting. that is the argument we are having. is this a person, our neighbor? if this is our neighbor, we ought to see to it that this person has a right to life, and to work to help women and children move forward. that is the reason why i am for laws protecting unborn children, and for creating the adoption culture and

widow care culture in our churches that we would welcome in children whose birth mothers have made adoption plans and we pregnant womenn in crisis. you see that around the country. host: columbus, ohio. justin. independent line. caller: i had a quick question on the religious freedom aspect. you said you looked at religious freedom but a couple

of issues have been brought up. you said there have been faith interests. what goes into the evaluation of whether there is a state interest or it should be left up to the individual? guest: that would depend upon the influence of the act on the rest of society. how does this affect our neighbors, the civic arena? we would all agree there are things we do not agree with, or that we would not choose ourselves to happen. i do not want to smoke cigarettes but i do not think smoking cigarettes ought to be illegal. abortion, for instance, is something i believe does not simply impact a person. it is not just a moral decision. it takes the life of another person, therefore the state has

an interest there. when it comes to marriage, most of us in this country do agree that the state has an interest in marriage. that is the reason why we have divorced laws, for instance, child support -- the state enforces child support because it is in the state's interest to see that children are not left without the safety net of stable families. the question then becomes what is the way to do that and what is the definition of a marriage, that is not restricting religious freedom. it is saying we have a responsibility to maintain a just society. host: dr. russell moore is president-elect of the ethics liberty religious commission. southern baptist convention did an interview that gain some attention. here is the headline in "the huffington post." it says that reverend fred luter said -- host: what did he mean, and is your response?

guest: he has spoken since then and said he was not make any connection between gay marriage and the north korean nuclear threat. -- guest: he has spoken since then and said he was not making any connection between gay marriage and the north korean nuclear threat. what he was saying is we are living in a time of great tumble and change and all of these are pressing issues facing us right

now. heiously i do not think believes that north korea is in response to what is going on in the united states of america when it comes to same-sex marriage. he has clarified that. fred luter is a heroic man, a godly man, who was one of the anchoring figures in new orleans after the katrina in leading the community toward recovery. i have nothing but respect for him. i do not think he is intending to say these issues are directly linked. he is simply saying we do not understand how to read our times with the great tumble going on around us. that is something many of the callers have expressed. host: cleveland, ohio, stephen is a republican. missr: good morning,

casey. i invite her -- admire you as an interviewer area -- interviewer. if i signed and 8 -- sound anything but cheerful is because i have not had my coffee yet and i am going to be 80 years old. i would like to ask a respectful question. host: we are listening, stephen. go ahead. guest: i am a baritone, i am a -- caller: i'm a baritone, i am a singer. i am a roman catholic but i sing in the choir of the first baptist church in cleveland, ohio. the reverend dr. is tremendous and i listen adamantly to his service and i just want to ask -- mr. moore where it says that joseph, mary were illegal immigrants.

host: are you saying they were illegal immigrants? werer: he said they illegal immigrants, and asking what basis does he use to say that? guest: i said earlier when we are welcoming the sojourner into a strange land that we need to recognize that our lord jesus was an immigrant in egypt. his parents took him into the egypt after the threat coming into arid after living in a strange land in exile. people that follow the lord jesus have compassion upon people who are taking their children out of difficult situations, going into a strange land where they do not know the people, do not have connections or support networks and show mercy to them.

host: go get some coffee, stephen, and we will move on to bobby in oklahoma. hi, bobby. caller: how are you? host: good. caller: you have had callers today that take it as a secular war on christianity -- this gay marriage issue. i am a homosexual. i am almost 40 years old. i was raised in the church. i am very familiar with scripture. i do not see it as a war. i see it is finally we are able to speak up for our civil rights. i do not think it distances me from god. i think that the definition of marriage would be a lifelong commitment between two people, male or female, that love each other and want to be together in the eyes of god forever, making a commitment. i have heard mention that it is

for protection of the children and the future of family values. i do not see how that is different from two people who are straight being married and having children when i have been in the same relationship for 13 years and i do not see ever being outside of that relationship and i have never have been. i think we are finally able to bring this out in the open. there are so many laws that are based on christian sexual morality and i think we are tired of having it shoved down our throats. host: bobby, we are just about out of time. let's get a response from russell moore. guest: i would not say that christian morality is shopping marriage down our throats. recently, there was a broad consensus in this country about what the minimal definition of marriage was. beendoes not mean we have living in an ideal society when it comes to marriage. we have had a marriage crisis

when it comes to divorce, cohabitation and all sorts of issues, but i do not think the answer of that is to expand the definition of marriage beyond natural limits. having said that, that does not mean that evangelical christians or catholic christians have hostility toward gay and lesbian neighbors. we do not. we have respect and love. we disagree about what the proper purpose of human sexuality is, which we believe is consigned to the marital union of a man and a woman, but we do not believe there is a war going on. most of us have gay and lesbian friends, neighbors. we do not seek to oppress people.

we seek instead to say that we believe this issue is important because god has designed sexuality to work in a certain way for the good of the people and human flourishing. it is not hostility, but a matter of disagreement. host: that is russell moore, president-elect of the southern baptist ethics liberty religious commission. thank you so much. >> two freshman senators, joe donnelly and heidi heidkamp have join lawmakers on the subject of gay marriage. they said their issues had evolved. only four democrats have not expressed support, mark pryor, tim johnson, mary landreau and joe manchin. mark kirk and rob portman are republicans who support gay marriage. primetime tonight, here on c- span, husband and wife

documentary producers talk about their film, "frack nation." and afterward we open the phone lines to get your response. on c-span 2, in depth with tom coburn. he has written a book called "the debt bomb."tha that is 8:00 eastern. a look at women's history in the u.s. suffrage913 women's parade in washington. that is ain washington. >> where is the predictability of judge bork. what are teh assurances as to where you'll be given the background and history. >> as a teenager into my 20's, i

was a socialist does not indicate fundamental instability. socialisto is a before he's 40 has no heart, older has no head. that is very common. >> those that you saw -- with the law and as i call them, the united states of the senate. specter was one of the toughest peopel to lobby and he did his homework. bork was a brilliant -- he was a -- he wrote the antitrust law and read the book. these guys were passing like two trains. and they never came together on

anything. >> tom korologos, sunday at 8:00 a." "q & richard prince says the associated press's style change for illegal immigrant was historic. umbiaoke at the colu journalism review on ratiacial issues. this is 90 minutes. >> i am thrilled about this and was thrilled about doing a racege in a new format on and class and for this columbia journalism review, we did an online forum using a tool called branch.

cindy said, we won't go through a lot of introductions and -- i want to go down the line. recently with the career lifetime achievement award, he writes rinchard prince's journalism, part of the maynard journalism institute. the chief operating officer of the diversity institute and the director of the first amendment center. jeff yang is the author of best selling books and also writes the dow jones with a t column for the wall street journal. and cepeda is a long-time film-

maker whose new book -- she is taking a picture of you. you have to read the new book. it takes a fascinating look at latino-american identity through everything from family history to dna and it is a fascinating look at the diversity within the diversity. thank you for being with us. this package is one where -- we cover a lot of territory but i want to turn to you to set the table. >> we'd start with basic numbers again, to give us a broad perspective on where things are in society and journalism. reported among newborns, minorities outnumberd whites in 2012, the first time in the nation's history.

sometime between 2043-2050, we will have a minority, majority society wehre no single racial group is over 50%. the district of columbia and texas and new mexico reached that, where there is no single 50% plus group. 11% of counties are in that already. so we watch the nation change in this dramatic fashion, where it occurs in the headlines and the numbers on newborns not reported in others. in terms of jobs naand incomes, poverty has fallen but it is 3 times the poverty rate among whites. young peopole of color were

likely to be hurt naand older whites -- invested more quickly and we see the economic d isparity. we see journalism -- in 2012's survey, the new one will be out in june. last year it was in april but the convention moved a few months. total newsroom employment by 2.4%. total loss was 5.7%. that is in print newsrooms and online. theythe report said were stabilizing in terms of total loss and loss of people of color but we'll wait to see what happens. it seems there is additional

layoffs in the news and we see how those impact everyone. the numbers increased in 2012 for those identifying as minority group members. as you take a longer look over time the numbers declined with higher profile changes in who is visible on those networks. radio is a positive spot. it is an interesting dynamic and change as the country becomes divers. at least in newsrooms, those numbers are not keeping up, something that we have seen beginning in the 1970's. >> one of the reasons that we linked coverage of race and

ethnicity with coverage of social mobility is they are intertwined. there have been articles lately that have talked about is journalism becoming a playground of the elite. content is not paying as much as it used to come and people are not making as much money, but repackaging other people's work, which has no value to the original person who wrote it, etc. how do we keep a diverse newsroom? there is a block from the start when people are looking for in turn ships. sted aoung woman, i hop recent college catcher it for six months who wanted to be a journalist, and there was no way she could deal with an unpaid internship. that was a way i could give back to my own committee, the

journalism community, because it deserves diversity, but why aren't we getting anyone? journalistic americans are soon to be an extinct group. great point because one of the things that traveled around the a mean social media feeds, one was a series of postings on different blocks about when you should lot for free, what is the price of content, and whereas the value of content has not changed, but the supply of it has altered the playing field. yet there was at the post by an attractive white female journalism about why she left news, which was fascinating to

me. the organizations we belong to have now increasingly had to start reshaping memberships and programming to orient aren't post-journalists. it is becoming a conversation now where it is only starting to hit home now that young white journalists cannot get jobs. that sounds harsh, but that seems to be where with the rubber is hitting the road. >> it is like documentaries for me. i have seen with documentary filmmaking and the ngo world, where only people that can afford to do it for free and be creative artists are the ones doing it. when i sat on panels for my last

documentary film, i was often the only person of color on the panel. about thee films were african diaspora. when you talk about the ngo world, it is always the children of rich white people. and the american ruling class that are having these jobs. you have societies that holistic we become dependent on seeing this images and figures of people in the position of savings. it is an organic thing that has multiple repercussions, and when i was reading articles you said, about being white in philly -- >> how do you really feel? >> i am inspired. when i was reading that, i kept on doodling and the only word i could write was gentrification, and i feel there has to be a biological diversity within

people being covered, but with people covering. it is a -- it does not matter black latino or an arab, american -- you have to have social diversity within journalism. you do not see that. >> one of the comments that you see on the article of the columbia journalism review article, you make a compelling case that it matters. ournt to say that we have devices and you can join us on twitter. we will be reading your material. let's get to phillie. there is the story about being white in philly. i remember when the stories were coming out, it was like "invasion of the body snatchers

," they would would all be brown. you followed this. can you explain more about this? >> the philadelphia magazine wrote a cover story called about it waswhite in philly," the ruminations of a white ailadelphia resident riled lot of a population of philadelphia, including the mayor and some of the black residents and journalists in philadelphia. it got the magazine a ton of publicity. there were at least two forums held on the topic. it raised issues we're talking about, including the fact that the media in philadelphia, the print media, were not diverse

and philadelphia magazine itself had no african-americans on its editorial staff. there was a piece written by somebody on the business staff, a black woman, who said this was oarsmen your, what this guy was riding. the issues that we are talking about in terms of the diversity. one of the things about the previous question, one of the reasons for this diminishing diversity is a lack of will by the people in power, people who have the power to hire and fire and change the climate of the country. we have the supreme court about to pull back further on affirmative action. people talking about this is a post-racial society, and all these things, it diminishes the ourncy for diversifying

journalistic staff at the same time we have the census bureau talking about the figures that you raised and that -- and apparently this other thread here about post-race role and we will worry about it tomorrow, is out tweeting the facts about the way the country is changing. >> i think that is 180 degrees wrong. we talked about post-racial, which is fiction, but we talk about an industry that decided that classified ads were forever their province. up with the idea that if you give away your content for free on the web people would pay for it, and they gave that away. three strikes you're out, failing to recognize this audience that is going to be increasingly diverse, increasingly expectant of people

who can talk to them -- the opposite of what that philadelphia magazine article said, which is being irrelevant, beyond shallow, being bad journalism. there's a host of titles for that story. if we missed this audience factor, that is it from a free press standpoint. i am very concerned, because that aspect of the media is the watchdog, the constitutional role, goes a long way with circulation of presence. we cannot afford to miss this third opportunity to do the best thing for the business and for a free press, to recognize to our audience really is. selling to one isolated slice. >> people are so risk adverse. gets examined publicly about race is one dimensional,

looked at almost exclusively from the perspective of people it gets examined is one dimensional, looked at almost exclusively from the perspective of the people of true,-- that is only not but a little insane. about theat i mean gentrification of journalism. how many comments does this article have put 7000? the white establishment, the ruling class have a larger their messagest out. look at limbaugh and 0 ral 'reasilly. this is getting to the heart.

i think a in a bizarre world, is can see coverage as it the difference between -- i think that put patient shows a misperception of the difference between coverage about people of copper -- color and coverage led by people of color. when we think of race, everyone has eight res. as you discussed in your book, ethnic identities and racial identities, we have been intermingling ever since the neanderthal smith homeless sapiens. once you talk about intermingling of cultures, it has happened for millennia. some people were perceived not to have a race in america if you were white, and there were books about the irish becoming white. it seems the quotation you

raised brings out this idea of how our industry can sometimes perceived a racial narrative and coming from a place it does not. just because people talk about -americans,n, asian it does not mean that that coverage is being led by a diverse group of people. >> there are a lot of different things that are worthy of attention. the first thing that struck me is is an evidence of the degree to which we are entering into a time where white americans are encountering this notion of race from the other side, that there is not this perception of a need to be on the playing field of race, not just as a background, but affirmatively.

are starting to get coverage like the one on being white in philly, which is not even the first such article to come out of philadelphia. if you guys remember, there was a story written by a forbes contributor that actually encompassed a lot of people who were journalists by self- definition were placed into the pool -- which is not a bad thing, necessarily -- but this guy was an i.t. consultant who wrote about issues of technology and decided to jump into the conversation about race and class by writing a screed called if i were a poor black child. it became one of the most viral -- in the negative sense -- peace is to appear under the

forbes browned. brand. because it came out under forbes, it said a forbes writer said i did these things from the perspective of a white citizen of philadelphia. if you do not have that at home, -- you know -- >> his position was not dissimilar from that of the author of that white in philly article. it came to the conversation about race from the standpoint of looking at it objectively from the outside. we will see more of that pit the notion of how we talk about race when we are not of the race or in the race. we can have greater insights because we are not part of .he scrum

we can say something interesting because we can see it from not having been immersed in it. the last point, is a i do not think you have to be a poet to write about race. newspapers have had foreign correspondents in other countries for centuries, and one of the things you are required to do is live in that country, learn the language, and even then you do not always get it right. >> all these points are excellent, and one thing i want to do the contextualized it is again, race and class link. there is an assumption in that piece about what a poor black kids to do, that everybody has broadband at home, which is not the case. there is really pour broadband penetration in poor homes. of what we are talking about is that time we are in where

assumptions are being the is atructed, that america european country is being de constructed. -- the veryws media question is the news media and objective authority is being constructed in a different way than that has been in the past, and that has been a question, but now we have this prism of different online outflux, fox news, msnbc, clearly staking out their territories. battle ofseeing this fiction versus reality coming out in the area of religion in the public's fear it we have always had that this additional attitude that a diverse religious society, but up until that we are- now

reaching this point and we are we have everh stepthan been, we're watching the struggles and the fight's going on sharply. maybe it is because things have become this approach to reality that we are seeing these intents differences in disputes. we also saw in the media when we talked about these issues, it was organizational institutional. now with the internet this is a huge factor that makes this moment unlike any other. everybody is a reporter, can be a reporter or a journalist by some definition. that is changing this dynamic in a way that this discussion we're having has never been able to be conducted, because it has always been how do we change these

large institution and ownership of institutions? the sudden people can reach out to the planet from one computer. will they have an impact? that is to be seen, but we're seeing this different change in the very nature of how do we diversify and how do we reach out, what do we hear back? i am excited to hear back in a way that we have never been able to hear back from community to --ate the stability an overe is eigh representation of people of color on twitter. i want to get to the question of resources. anyone can jump in. your example about the documentary film world is important. anyone can be a journalist.

they can, but the resources still are the megaphone. if you do not have the resources to amplify your voice you will be drowned out. ofreasingly i see a lot journalism funding moving like venture-capital funding, like these investments in combined howform meets content, but do different groups of color fit into that world it to this entrepreneurial journalism world? >> i think we have talked about this offline, that sometimes in order to get funding you have to debase yourself. viral this is like lynching by a black man to black and brown people. he is doing no better than what this man wrote the article about being white in philadelphia.

it is terrible, and what happens he got a magazine profile but he gets a lot of hype. you have citizen journalist out there for example. i saw the tea party rallies and a lot of citizen journalism done throughout that, that i thought was really good, because people were unguarded and it was people talking to another, and you got to see the temperature that was going on in america. one thing that stood out to me was people saying she'd now and ask questions later, ted nugent for president. you see how totally remorseful white people work for putting barack obama an office the first time. you saw it. you saw the blood back from that during the tea party rallies. i feel that this stuff we've really need to see. not get the funding

that the world star hip-hop will get to. >> is a demeaning site that uses pop as a wonderful art form as a marketing tool. >> not only that, it is not even hip-hop. -- on the news where a a young black man was stripped from his clothes for $20 in jersey city and whipped other black men, and we go inained about "djan chaines"? he makes money off that site. >> that is depressing. let me point out some positive things i have seen in documentary's.

book called "oad thatest of the vampire," was turned into a film that has not gotten distribution, but it is out there and i hope it does get wider distribution. talked about how these immigrants came to the united states in the first place, which is something that has been missing from the immigration discussion, and the point that is made is that a lot of the reason why these people from these various latin american countries are in the united states is because of actions the united states has taken in those countries to lifeish the quality of

there and to force these folks out of those countries and into the united states. i raise that one because of two points. there are some documentary's -- documentaries need people to be aware of them, but doing something like that requires resources and it is something that you cannot get from the proliferation of social media. requiresrting resources. and as much as the news environment is changing, that is something that is a factor. the other thing i saw was on pbs and it was by the national black programming consortium, and they spent a year in a d.c. high school, alternative school, 180 days."

i was not enamored of watching another special about what it is like in the school, but this one sucked me in. it was taking the whole issue of school reform out of the theory from the- told it viewpoint of what is going on in the schools and what the teachers and students have to deal with. and it gave you a different point of view on that whole issue. what happened -- not giving anything away -- what happened ,n the documentary, four hours was the teachers and students had to deal with all these social issues before the they even get to the school, what is gone on in the home, the neighborhood. is a tremendous achievement just

to be in the school. the teachers made that point clearly paid what happened in the documentary was that after these rules downtown went about how you have to score so much on the scandal -- on these tests, the rug was pulled out on the principle and the school before they have the chance of completing the process of getting the kids to the point where they could do well on those schools. spanning -- spending a year in a school requires resources, so i have to emphasize that journalism requires resources. substitutea is not a for good reporting. that is something i wanted to point out. >> also, that documentary got little attention from the media as well, so it requires somebody

on the other and to say this is important. real labor of love for and funding is definitely always an issue. the question is how can we hack it? does anybody have any idea about how funding can be more equitable? >> he changed the people who are doing the funding. could argue the same tools and the same technology platforms that are leveling the playing field in terms of who has voiced also offers opportunities who can change the funding as well. the biggest challenge that we are seeing is that as with

thehing you have to -- kinds of things to get cloud funded are the things that have n in diaz -- an idiosyncratic audience. if you are trying to do an investigation of something that is obscure in a different way and focused on something beyond type, itage geek will be much more challenging. that is what we are seeing, a discomfort zone that is happening at the transition point. one is the notion that the established media to some combination of cloud media or citizen media.

we're looking at the use of center-out platforms to a more level peer to peer and troop directional types of media. we are looking at that demographics shift between a majority-minority society to one where we are trying to have to think about terms like minority and whether they make sense. it is comical to say that minorities now outnumber white people. at what point do they no longer become minorities? thought, wait a minute, if you're more than -- it is more of an historical term of art. maybe it will go away. >> the new plurality. there is also a generational gap. you're talking about world starke hip-hop which more people have seen that anything you have talked about.

what will happen to pbs if they continue to market the way they are marketing to the new generation of documentary film lovers and social media kids who pbs does not speak to, does not do out reached to. it will make it harder for us to make films and make easier for people who want to debase their communities and spread untruths to create their own productions. >> i want to bring up an example from my own career where one of the things i love to do is talk to people who are from all backgrounds. when i say all, had net people in a parking lot during a blizzard. i will go to great lengths to have interesting discussions. i think it is important, one of the issues for me as a reporter who loves field reporting, getting the money to do field reporting is so hard.

i did an independent radio documentary project where i people at a tea party right. i stay in touch with some of these people when the money dries up for field reporting would become disconnected. each other, and groups can hate groups, but individuals can hate individuals, but once you start breaking down to an individual is, i found common ground with people.ns they thought being a racist was the best way to take care of their family. getting out in the field makes you understand the motivation that enables you to think what you are doing is right. most people do not think they are doing the wrong thing. it is part of our job to unare

the human nature, but i'd want to think of if we are moving is becoming more diverse, the media, less so. how can we steer around that i spurred instead of crashing into it? >> there is that race with the institutions that have resources to address in generational, gender, race issues. at some point this mass media that has provided resources that has funded so many different ways the kind of journalism we at meyer, either it wakes up to this new reality of the audience or it will fade away. i do not know what follows. we see that nothing right now individually on the web has the institutional power to do what a lot of organizations can do when they are willing to do it. we are still in that transition zone.

i have to remind myself that the web is 15 years old. it is a sprightly teenager. it does not know where it is going and. abilitycan terms of the to watchdog government. there is the argument that local newspapers and others who used to cover other institutions are gone, but the bloggers are interested in the street pay being in the neighborhood. when that issue goes away, that person goes away. along with the challenges is the idea of continuity. there is an institutional memory of what has become before to build on, and i do not know where we are going without as we become this -- more interested webber.ey low han's

whatever. >> i hate to slam someone for doing their job, but the taylor swift piece in vanity fair was so dreadful but taylor swift is upset that people talk about her love life even as she talks about it all the time it ok, that was the blurb. now we are done. the story itself was incidental. you are right. know weng is -- and i seum, in theusnew archival ballot of the beast when it comes to the collective memory and the institutional status of the traditional press, but a lot of this collective -- unconscious is not as

good at what is supposed to have been doing as we had hoped. one of the things we see is because of the desire to put these standards in place because of the privileging of the ways that we have covered news in the past, a lot of the standards that reflect what is considered to be gored journalism or accurate or fair journalism come out of a world where that news judgment was being made in a different kind of social economy. you still see that. on american rap journalism is that the pursuit of balance -- we lose accuracy. >> we overemphasize the points that are not valid. >> indeed, and the notion of

the open window, as you get left and right the more extreme one or the other side gets, the more likely you have that middle balance shifted away. it becomes more so, the notion of who is in the role, who is an accurate person to speak from the perspective of race is very complicated, when the because you are of a certain race your are expected to be an expert on being that certain race. even those of us who are journalists find ourselves in that circumstance of being required to speak for the race too frequently. it is one of those conundrums. if you are not speaking from that position, no one will speak for a, or somebody less qualified will speak for it, but if you do you find yourself being in that seven people who are required to carry that.

>> i want to switch to something we got on our twitter feed. rse.ive this is from katchow. basically, the move away which "ou wrote about, from using illegal immigrant," was a fight brought up by groups like applied research center which puts out color lines . tell costs about the shift. >> yesterday the associated press announced it was day -- changing its style book entry on and them immigration", reason that is important, that

style is used by many newsrooms, the majority of newsrooms in united's it is easier than creating your own. the associated press. they decided they would no longer use the term "illegal "illegal alien," so you would talk about people who are in the country illegally and use terms such as that. this has been a fight that is going on since the 1980's, and ispresents --language political. it was interesting to see the a p responding to

officer of all this time to what these groups have been saying. we saw the same thing: on in politico with pro-life and pro- choice, and affirmative action vs. race role preferences, and verses gayrriage marriage. these are people who are advocates for all those causes fight within the media for their term to be the preferred term so for it makes people -- so the associated press to decide that being illegal is not the first and foremost thing you should know about some one by uri human being first is an achievement. inthat is an achievement 2013? i am trying to think about something really cool and profound to the statement, because i am latino and i present every latino in america.

i cannot find something profound to say about that. i think it is ridiculous we are having this conversation. your point about having to represent your race, you could go on, but what do you think is gonna happen as we begin to surface the identities within these groups? africample, i am half and half black americans, some even my ethnicity is mixed in a way that traditional -- there isn't now a lot of writing about at mixtures. give us a perspective from your book on what you learned about the latino community and broaden its to how you see coverage of

latinos changing. >> a lot of stuff in the book i could not get placed elsewhere in the mainstream media because people did not want to talk about at. they cannot wrap their heads to the petriea that dish in the new world was in the dominican republic. if you want to be an american, you should try to emulate been latina as much as you can butuse the european summit, -- settlement, the first one that was successful in the new world, was in santo domingo. all these things happened there that the gatt who we are today. yet you come here and all of a sudden you are illegal or you are made to feel that you're not part of the american dream which needs to be debunked. maybe a separate panel.

isme, at the end of the day a holistic think. when you go to school and you start to learn about history and your people are primitive or that they are savages and the original the legal heir aliens, the europeans, come here and loving freedom, and you have children you see in debt statistics become an invisible. then you have journalists, part of the gentry, writing about those same people during sandy and write about them as if they were invisible, so i think i am not as hopeful about the future of the discussion of race because i do not think there is enough biological diversity within even our races, the people who are writing about us, i did not think there is

enough diversity within their groups, but to have a good thorough and thoughtful discussion. asianf, began speak about everybody here has a hashtag. one goalie and birthmarks -- mono goalie and birthmarks. you can multitask. part of the circle is we did have black, white, asian, latino, native american, and now we are teasing out people's countries of origin, how that affects -- the caribbean- american community is different,

the difference communities within the chinese communities -- will we get to a point where we can understand that new wants? nuance. >> this is taking us back a step, but you mentioned native americans, and every time i see the legal immigrant, i am sure native americans have a different perspective of what illegal immigrant means, given the history of america's borning. that speaks to where we are as a culture. they are terms of the moment, snapshots of what the context we , ve in calls certain things whoever is at the top of the social economy food chain at the current moment. what i think is -- when we talk about journalism, i am not a

subscriber to the notion of the journalist as paul what, as the gatekeeper of truth. but i believe that journalists have a specific responsibility and specific capability of the least have a good filters. it means you have to be diverse, have to have a pool of people to speak with when you are not certain you have that right. that type of skepticism of not being able to tell even if you are not of my store, that the store is not right yet, is something we are starting to lose in the pace of news that we have gotten too. that is where we are right now, with the coverage of race. i do not think we can survive as an industry if we try to say the only way that people can cover a certain thing is if they have a certain background, a certain specific context from

which to speak. journalism is about telling stories that matter to a broad array of people, not purely a one-to-one customize perspectives. at the same time, i think the take away from this it really is zone, foris comfort journalism to evolves, it needs to incorporate different types of journalism, that there is not as one kind that will fit all occasions. you need to be able to filter and appropriately allocate resources and deliver and distribute news into the right channel based on not just the understanding of what news is now, but what news is becoming. i would attach more importance to the ap change

because it comes better late than never, and it sets a tone right from the start when you read that story, although i understand to some degree we were 50 years ago or the native american views centuries ago. in terms of the language, i am hosted george carlin one year, and he did this wonderful riff on language and identifiers, which he posed the question, what do you call and white person from south africa who emigrates to the united states? he pointed out the invalidity of many of those labels because what does that mean? >> whenever we may get to me. >> i hope we increasingly see that the minister in our society cannot looking at people from a

journalistic standpoint and from the selection. you put your finger on the next challenge, and that is the people making the decisions about resources about coverage, funding, are they waking up? are they realizing this new world out there may be if has been there, but it will be increasingly and their face. if only to push sales, to do circulation. i keep thinking every year we will see this light bulb go off when they say it is the right thing to do, but is the economic thing to do, and i keep waiting for that, and maybe we are approaching it step-by-step. at some point we have to recognize this diverse aspect of our society in ways we have never done before. >> i will go to questions. i see what in the audience. i see a few.

richard, any thoughts? >> a lot of thoughts were running through my mind. >> a lot of ground. >> let me say that the success of diversity in journalism will depend on the success of diversity in society. that is why stories about standards ofd living and those things are important to journalists because where are the journalists going to come from? they are going to come from beens, and people who have well educated, who know how to spell, who know how to speak well, and if those things are not delivered in an equitable fashion throughout the rest of society, you are not gonna keep get the new angelo -- -- you are

not going to get the journalism you need in this music rooms. the other thing is the issue of diverse coverage and who tells the stories is also important because i do not believe that a lot of these issues have to be dealt with in isolation. theing a story about environment can be a diverse story depending on the frames of reference that are used in each story, the sources used, the examples that are used, and this is woven throughout the entire news operation, that makes for a more diversity. buddy who may not want to read about what is going on in a toxic waste dump in a poor neighborhood might want get a

glimpse of that by reading about something else that happens to use that as a reference point. diversity comes in a lot of forms, but the important thing is that is is there. it is woven throughout the news product. >> let's go to questions. i see one right there, the lady in the black and white top. give us your name. i am continuing journalist. i teach at american university. i want to pursue a little further without being to crest this economic argument. pew storyhe inpew that people are noticing the cutbacks. argument,e economic

the brand, but let me be crass. i have friends under a lot of pressure at newspapers and networks, and if you are given a choice to cover a toxic waste dump or that when a whole story that was in "the new york times ," that author is not somebody you normally hear from. what is the economic argument you can make about why should they cover poor people? why should they cover people who are not gentry? gone through this time of infatuation with eyeballs and analysts telling us that shallower the coverage the broader. when it the internet came up it was a toy. it was fine to find 50,000

references about roofing nails. then it was a tool to find out about roofing nails. it has gone far beyond that. what is happening in that short life is news that matters. things that are important are coming back to the foure. news that matters. people arell you why recognizing it. i see this race between oblivion that when these ratings are down, people are turning off to these institutions that have to exist. i hope the sense we're getting back to news that matters and that reflects communities takes hold before the economic model implodes. on a day-to-day basis of very between it is going to have the right way and it is not one to happen. it is a pressing question because i think it says what

about the news that is valuable to all of our communities, news that counts, and diversity to be in such a thread within the rationale for a free press and the survival of a free press, it has to occur, so i will be more apocalyptic. see the whole thing going away if we do not become more important and focus on news that matters to a bunch of communities. it is the fact that there still aren't toxic waste dumps 50 years after we found that the epa. why isn't that story done? i have won four in the tar pit at my age, i still think people want news that is viable, documentaries that teach me not just entertain me. the economic rationale for me is maybe we can to stop for a day and write news that counts

and see what happens. because i think about this all the time because of what i do is entrepreneurialism all and i have to look at raising money and numbers, but i think that there was -- this may be going at a field, but stay with me. when a worked at abc, company is owned by a larger entity, and it sometimes gets held to standards that do not suit. i felt -- this is my opinion -- i felt abc was being held to disney standards in terms of revenue. news will not generate the same profits as entertainment. just in general. a lot of times he's has been held to an entertainment, particularly tv news, in terms of the revenue is expected to generate. news was not doing badly by news

standards. we changed the standards that news was judged by, and got into a fear and panic cycle which has met over time, the demographic of network news has become older and there were, and there is now a gap that either can or cannot be filled depending on different management decisions to reach down demographically and out diversity twice. part of the issue was a lot of different ways and these were otherf larger companies, holding companies that did not news work appeared one person said to me that 7% return is right for healthy news company. that is not good enough for some of the larger entities. that creates a huge problem.

>> let's go to the next question. [indiscernible] >> yay, baltimore. >> [indiscernible] >> one second. how about we get to the other mike. entities your sow. about my lot preference. about when then these decision makers are want to wake up. my question is a lot of this decision makers are white. i am a white person in a majority black city doing a series about inequality. you have to make yourself

vulnerable. you have to go out on a limb to do these issues right, which means if you are doing it as a right -- white person you have to make yourself more trouble. county youth make the discussions are richer? as a white speak person. >> whoever wants. the point about the overall point about making yourself vulnerable being part of the process is important. >> to the degree -- i think it is by having people in your newsroom who tell you about these things that you may not know. there is education going on every time somebody with a different perspective is in your news repaired there are fewer people, and we are losing minority representatives faster do, that representation is declining faster this is the spiral you're talking about.

it is education, information, willing to say to yourself -- and willing to make the argument to your boss. to go out and say, from an economic standpoint, what are the demographics involved? look at that and you say if we just pitch to the same audience that sells stories, the same group we are doing 30 years ago, we are going to die. i would rather people did this because they felt it was proper and moral and the right thing to do, but i am not adverse to saying there is no revenue they're prepared you want to talk about revenue, let's talk about that market. that's the stories -- then we up in our members will be and youest nielsen's,

begin to make the argument. we cannot sit and say it is the right thing to do. there is an economic argument to be made here. you have to look at the last political cycle. if you want to be a winner and anything now, you need to look at that out come and see where coalitions and the groups have power. to me that is an economic article -- are given. >> we have a question in the front row. >> one concern i have run the economic argument is that it is coming at a time when you have a vested stake holder shift in certain platforms that are channeled arecked properly for certain audiences didn't engage. >> give us a concrete example. >> newspapers. the reality is when we talk

about these papers and who is reading newspapers, whether or not there is a generation of young people of color who are reading newspapers by default, the answer generally speaking is are the newspapers and the right place? are they making available geners our newspapers in the right place? -- they at the right place price? are they making available the andt kinds of distribution circulation models to make that content available? even if you were writing appropriately for that audience , are you actually delivering the platform that the largest mass you are not speaking to is capable of engaging with.

there are free papers that have been launched in various cities to some success. obviously most newspapers have websites. tablets. >> this is newspaper to me now. >> speaking of what you were saying, i live in crown heights, brooklyn, which has traditionally been considered a lower income neighborhood and is going through rapid gentrification. i just moved there three years ago after living in a very high- priced neighborhoods in manhattan. i love my neighborhood. in brooklyn. there is now a new york times seller at my subway stop. just happened. gentrification bulls and in the newspaper. . with that been nice to have it i am like gentrification bulls in and then the newspaper. it would have been nice to have it before. i think there are assumptions at play. let me go to my next.

wait. i just wanted to applaud your question about how to relate to these other folks. i had an interview at the editor -- with the editor of milwaukee. it was after the shooting of -- sikhs in the area. he said i love having people not like me around. as a journalist, i thrive on that. that is part of being a journalist. he should have people like that around you who just love learning about new things. that is what adds to the diversity. >> three pulitzers at that

paper. they have someone who knew about medical issues. diversity, again, across a range of talents and knowledge. >> it goes back to that a sick curiosity of journalism. with thenthony romero a cl view. we have been concerned with the freedom of. we have to do less and less on these days. that's covered very well but newspapers. look for a place for freedom of speech or the press is being shut down but that is much less for us. for us, the press has become the mentality of our work. how do we work with the press and promote other issues? when i reflect upon my 12 years as director of the organization, the best relationships i've had with journalists have been with white journalist. that is not because i prefer talking to white journalist. i think it is just because the

alchemy of that relationship has been different than with minority journalist. with one exception, bob herbert. a relationshiph with a journalist in the deepest way -- how can i move the ball forward on the issue i care about? how can we make change? policy change, societal change, and understanding about a complex issue. unless you have a journalist who will cover the story over and over again like a beat, you do not have the ability with a one off. reporters iurity think are quite good on this one. >> why do you think you had in a more constructive experience with white reporters? was it because they were in the right position, more receptive? >> they were covering the stories over and over again.

>> social capital. >> on race issues, it is one off. it is a different journalist each day covering immigration, housing, employment, voting. you do not develop the report -- the rapport. i want to make sure we are covered, that our cases are covered. it is not the rapport --my aestion to you is, i know as puerto rican, i would not want to be the guy covering puerto ricans. having the beat to cover the puerto rican community would seem like being placed in the ghetto again. get pd journalists who will cover our communities -- yet we need the journalists who will cover our communities. christina what is funny. when a dominican covers dominican americans, i am in the ghetto --

>> you know what is funny? when a dominican covers dominican american, i am in the ghetto. like amenities have more social capital thinking unities of color and you see that in that journalists have more social capital then journalists of color and you see that. if it journalists of color gets to be able to have great space in a major, mainstream newspaper, that usually gets rotated out because there are only so many you allow. when bob herbert held onto his column for a long time, he was under pressure for years. >> exactly. i used to hear stories about that all the time. you are dealing with different kinds of social capital here. >> this is something i've been talking about with richard. >> by the way, david gonzales in the new york times is puerto rican and he writes dutifully

about puerto ricans and other people. you should check them out. his photo exhibit i went to recently. amazing. richard and i have been exchange and correspondence about this. there is something inherently interesting about the fact that the proxy for a journalist to actually has a beat and can cover should tediously and longitudinally a topic is white journalist. cover strategically and longitudinally a topic is a white journalist. these are the individuals who have that social capital. more than that, the particular status of being able to focus on a concern in a way that allows them to overtime the the credibility

in that space and to choose an judge news as opposed to having it assigned to them. the one place where journalists of color have been able to sneak in and establish a platform where they can talk about race without it being a one off is when they are columnist. when they are actually op-ed contributors and no longer held to the standard of report of the day, etc. that is one place where you are seeing fewer faces of color. you mentioned about herbert. i am a colonist who happens to write about topics that are close to my areas of interest and have the freedom to do so. i write about asian and asian- american issues and that is after many years of covering those things. it is a complete happenstance that i have been able to do so. i have never gone through the mill again in a newsroom or

general if i meant and all the other things -- or general assignment and all the other things that the crew to social .apital there is no path anymore with in newsroom to do that. >> that is another problem that goes back to the systemic existence of these organizations. the beats that could have increased hiring, if we brought people through and gave them opportunity, those pathways are removed from new kids to apprentice to expert to the owner of that topic, we do have that chance to spend time. those are gone. we do a program that looks at the coverage of federal courts. there are probably that many people now full-time covering the federal court system in america. as a full beat.

there is this loss of the systemic ability. if we look at the rise of ethnic may be on the social side we will be able to see people with someterritory funding source but at least there is an audience to attract people to it. i do not see the beats of them coming back in standard media for a long time. if at all. there is a necessity to develop that expertise may have a multiplicity of voices. right now we are an impasse in terms of developing. about cal and -- caveat colonist. a lot of columnist of color do

write about race but they also hear from their editors and readers, all you ever write about is race. whether they are writing about it or not. so there is that counter pressure also. >> i fully acknowledge that. i hear about it myself. it is less whether [indiscernible] of color inlumnist particular who are still able to speak and have a little photo that designates them of a race, if their last name doesn't aready say so, it is almost safety zone to be talking about these topics because they are speaking from an opinionated position. >> if you have a brief comment,

i will go to our last question. >> the solution is to have people of color and management. they can put all those threads throughout the whole operation they are in charge of. why don't you have any sources of color of the story? could you talk to so and so. i'm going to take both of your questions back to back. there are a lot of different people who of questions we will not be able to get to. >> thank you. i'm a poet, political blogger, cultural critic. , as i goation starts around to poetry events around the area, i find despite the plurality that are emerging, rage stratification. ,f i go to busboys and poets there are 90 blacks in the room

and i am one of two or three others. if i go to the writers center, it is all right -- all white. and occasionally a black shows up. what is the bowl in journalism and pulling these diverse immunities back together -- what is the role in journalism in the pulling these diverse communities back together? >> thank you. we will take your thimble of them both up together. >> -- about both ofk them. >> i've heard the word race but not social -- but not class. reduce these topics, race, class -- where do these topics, race, class, overlap? >> thank you for bringing that up. upyou ove a robust -- if

go online, we crunch the social mobility issues. we did not funnel into that track enough. the questions on the table right now that we want to end up with our, any thoughts on how social haveity and the changes affected the journalism quest. i love the question about how do we reclaim that town hall space of news. >> the first question, basically by having more diversity, social economic, social political, gender, and the management positions. >> we have raised terms about social mobility and cls. things like wealth-based

hegemony of being able to be a journalist. you have to be able to afford to do it now. you certainly cannot earn a living by doing it. that is making it more and more challenging to ensure that there is arrow and accurate coverage of inequality within the context of that. -- educational context, middle-class backgrounds, circumstances where theown social context in way we perceive inequality, it becomes more challenging to provide a thorough dialogue around issues of what wealth means. we do need to have that kind of diversity.

this bite the working class --e-collar journalists despite the working-class blue- collar journalists who works their way up, that does not happen so much anymore. , nowews media especially that we see more trends vdf type type stuff,nsmedia there is more of a cultivating perception around what types of individuals represent good news iconography. and they have to be well spoken, articulate and so forth. those unfortunately also translate often into issues of class as well. i was struck by the fact that when i got into journalism, if you look around the average , people having trouble

getting a car loan, it was very different. i did ang reporter interview with jesse jackson at operation push. he said something i just remembered. itwas educating me and said is difficult to perceive right now but race will be the easier question for america to settle. , economic class issues of class that will be the tougher thing. this had to be 35 years ago. i think it has been an undercurrent in the civil rights movement. it is probably now really going to come to for. i'm depressing myself thinking we are still struggling with racial issues. that this class issue has yet to be. but as we stratify, it may be the bigger challenge.

>> where to begin? we talk about the march on washington was for jobs and read him. during the civil rights movement, there was a conscious for publicde to go policy rather than economics. that was the thread also. the civil rights movement had a range of people who had a range of approaches. the urban league, that was their thing. jobs. this is community, economics. other people said let's go to the streets. others had voter registration. what we remember about that time now, we do not remember the part and that economics got overshadowed by some of these other considerations. >> that is a big place to leave it. to remember that race and have always been intertwined. andclass and journalism

race and journalism have also been intertwined. this is not anything we are going to puzzle through easily. ofgot here after many years struggling with american identity, race and class and we are going to keep wishing. i think that is one thing we hear. nobody here is shy. everybody here is passionate and there is still so much passion left amongst us in the media for tackling these issues and i want to thank everyone and with us in the room everyone on the tea and the aclu -- everyone on the team and the aclu. it is wonderful to have you here with us again. thank you all. [applause]

[captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2013] >> lauren frost and camille torfs-leibmaar third-place winners in c-span's studentcam contest. they attend eastern middle school in silver spring, maryland. in their video, lauren and camille ask the president to focus on water quality and the environment. ? >> everybody needs clean water. we rely on it to drink, cook, clean, and to live. yet we standby and watch corporations violate national laws daily. 40% of rivers and 46% of lakes in the united state are too polluted to fish, swim, and drink.

>> in the 1960's, president lyndon b. johnson called the potomac river a national disgrace. it was choked with pollution from shore-to-shore algae slime across it so thick that you could deep your hand in it and your hand would come out green as if you had stuck your hand in a can of green paint. >> on june 21, 1969, the cuyahoga river in cleveland ohio caught fire when a train rolled by and its sparks flew off the track, uniting the vast oil spots in the river. >> in 2002, the u.s. reached a record for largest dead zone in u.s. history. it sits at the mouth of the mississippi river. when it rains, runoff filled with sewage and many other harmful chemicals are washed off streets and is drained into the mississippi river and enters the gulf of mexico. this nutrient overload leads to a surplus of algal blooms, killing the majority of aquatic life in the area.

>> in 2012, this dead zone was the size of connecticut. >> in april of 2010, the bp infamous oil spill terrorized the country. >> nearly 200 million gallons of toxic crude oil were spilled in some of the richest, most diverse waters anywhere in the world. we know that thousands of birds were killed -- whales -- everything from shrimp to sperm whales, plankton to pelicans. we know that there were plumes of oil the size of manhattan at 3,000 feet of water careening through this gulf. we know that this is was a carpet of oil up to two inches thick that has been found up to 80 miles from that spill site. >> local and national water protection efforts were written until 1972 when the clean water act was firmly established. >> the clean water act contains a very democratically principled provision, which allows for suits and civil suits penalties in the event the responsible agency is not enforcing its own

law to protect citizens' rights to safe, clean water. >> according to the epa, the clean water act prohibits anybody from discharging pollutants to a point source into a water of the united states unless they have an npds permit. the permit contents limit on what you can discharge, monitoring and reporting requirements, and other provisions to ensure that the discharge does not hurt water quality or people's health. an npds permit will specify an acceptable level of pollutant or pollutant parameter in a discharge. npds permits make sure the state's mandatory standards for clean water and the federal minimums are being met. >> the national pollutant discharge illumination system is basically the system that we have in place to ensure that we have fishable and swimmable water here in the united states.

what we do is basically -- it is illegal for any point source to pollutant into our waters without getting a permit, and then we allow polluters to receive a permit to discharge into the water. >> numerous other acts have been proposed as well, each focusing on individual aspects of water quality and protection. >> the continuous efforts, permits, and acts seem like great solutions to providing all americans with clean water but sadly, corporations all over the united states are constantly violating these permits. >> laidlaw international incorporation works with waste collection embossing and needs to dump mercury on a regular basis. laidlaw broke the discharge limitation in their npds permits 13 times as well as committing 13 monitoring and 10 reporting violations. similar violations occur all

across the united states. these kinds of pollution are classified as point source pollution but there is also nonpoint source pollution. >> it does not actually cover agricultural runoff like waste from turkey farms and chicken farms we have here in maryland, and so this is clearly not a strong-enough system to ensure that we are going to have the clean water that we deserve in maryland. >> we need clean water as described in the clean water act but what is being done to maintain it? organizations such as friends of the earth are working on strengthening the requirements. we need to make polluters realize that dumping into our precious resource will be more of a hassle in the long-term in thinking of a way to get rid of the pollution once and for all. >> one of things that we hear at friend of earth really care about is making polluters pay for their pollution, putting a price on pollution. we let polluters pollute for free.

we do not charge them for what they discharge into rivers and streams. by putting a price on pollution, we would have a real economic incentive to produce in a more responsible and more sustainable fashion. >> what do we still need to do? every year 14 billion pounds of sewage, sludge, and garbage are dumped into the world's oceans. on top of that, another 19 trillion gallons of waste are discharged. to ensure that generations after us have clean water, we need to do more than charge these companies for polluting. we need to educate people about their affect on local waterways. we also have to limit the amount of pollution that a company is allowed to dump into the water under a permit. >> i think that permitting part of a larger solution to protecting our water. obviously, we have had the clean water act 1972. it has a stated aim of making every river and stream in the united state fishable and swimmable.

we have fallen far short of that, so we are clearly not doing enough to protect our water. this system, while better than nothing, is clearly inadequate. >> the clean water act and npds permits are not as strong as they need to be. we as a country need to take action to strengthen the permits and the acts so we can make earth's water swimmable, fishable, and drinkable. it is time to make some significant changes to the system in place. these changes include charging companies to obtain the permits, strengthening limits on the amounts of pollution companies can dump into a river under the program, and institute strict pollution guides for all of america's water. >> dear mr. president, help us look towards the future and create strictly enforced national laws that protect our waters for the present and future. let us work together to make our waters swimmable, drinkable, and

fishable for ourselves and the generations to come because water pollution affects everyone. >> you can find this video and >>hers at studentcam.org. prime time tonight. husband and wife documentary reducers talk about their film "frack information." afterwards, we open the phone minds to get your response live. on c-span2, and depth with senator tom coburn. he is represented oklahoma since 2005 and plans to retire after his current term. he has written a book called " the debt bomb." that is that it :00 eastern. withk at women's history scenes and interviews from a

centennial celebration of the 1913 women's suffrage parade. that is all night at 8:00 eastern. wednesday on her last hour, look at recent magazine articles, part of our spotlight on magazine series. today, pacific standard in the recent addition about the oil boom spanning the country. lisa martinelli is a editor joining us from new york this morning. she is also the author of oil on the brain. you write in the pacific standard addition the energy we arewe are having -- not having when it comes to natural gas and tracking. explain. >> we are talking a lot about should be fractal or not crack -- frack or not frack? we have people who say that

this will lead to more jobs for americans. are not really discussing is what happens to all the people who live -- live on top of the gas and the oil. the franking boom is high density. a lot of holes are drilled in people's yards. what we are not doing in places that do not have a long history of drilling, they are not charging very much in taxes and closely still all not regulated, places like texas and oklahoma have a long history of regulation and taxes. these new places don't. that means the burden of this drilling is going to fall on the people who lived above the wells. you get to that in north dakota where they are overrun with people looking for jobs. they have all the trucks driving around, and they have natural

gas associated with the oil in north dakota as -- that means extra pollution. there is this crazy feeling amidst the flares. you see that happening all over the country. we are not discussing how to make fracking safer. instead, we are discussing this unreal issue of frack or not frack. that is not the issue. most laws are set up to enable drilling. host: what is fracking? guest: it is a process of drilling. first, you drill the hole down for the oil or gas. in the old days, gas and oil war in places that were relatively easy to get to. they were not in pools underground, but they were not locked into kind of a structure of sand and calcium and other minerals.

what happens now is that these other sorts of reservoirs have oil and gas trapped in pockets. you have to fracture the rocks around them to get to them. they put water and other things called chemicals that will sort of -- they try to smash the rock with high-pressure water and they stick things in to hold the fractures open. you are fracturing the rock. with natural gas, it is pretty much a straight hole. with oil in north dakota, you are drilling down and taking a right angle and going across underground. then they are fracturing and those underground chambers. host: what is been the result of all of this drilling that we

have seen in our country, according to the eia, here is one chart. it has increased 12-folder -- 12-fold. guest: that is huge and it is our future. it is the president of natural gas. -- present. this is simply price of gas down to the store at lowe's. it is good for us consumers. we are all able to cook and heat and thereby electricity cheaper than we would have back when gas was more scarce. as far as oil goes, the oil boom combined with other drilling initiatives in the u.s. means for the first time since the 1850's, the u.s. increased its oil production by 800,000 barrels a day last year.

that was a huge jump in production. that is exactly the amount of oil that china's oil consumption increased by. that is one of the reasons that you have not seen a fall in oil prices for u.s. consumers. host: we are talking was a talking with lisa margonelli, contribute in editor -- lisa margonelli. call with your questions and comments -- host: you can also send us a tweet. in these communities where there is this natural gas underneath the shale, who are the companies and what are they promising?

guest: it varies. there is a mixture of the big companies and new companies in the new natural gas areas and oil areas. you have the companies like conoco phillips or somebody big, and in your recognize and lots of upstarts. they are promising that they will get people who live on the land, people who own the mineral rights under leeland to get royalties. people who live on the land get some some sort of payment for allowing the drilling. what has happened is that lots of interest groups have said there will be booming jobs. one forecasted was that there would be millions of jobs by 2030, new jobs based upon the gas boom.

so far, in places like pennsylvania, you see a very small uptick and local jobs. the jobs are not getting through. they are a secondary promise of jobs, if you have lots of cheap, natural gas, we will be able to make cheaper glass or cheaper plastics and this will create a resurgence in manufacturing in the u.s.. that is not panning out at this point. for one thing, a lot of these industries have already cut their labor force dramatically. even though they have cheaper inputs, they are not actually increasing their labor force. a very old ohio company which you think would benefit from cheap natural gas write-in its backyard just laid off 200 workers.

the question of whether the jobs are coming is a big question. the other thing is, there is a lot of environmental impact, not just from the drilling overflowing or poisoning something, there is also an environmental impact from the trucks carrying fracking to and from the wells. there is a tremendous impact on the roads around the areas. then you have a third effect, which is that when age really boom happens, some of the local jobs that have been there for generations to write up. -- dry up. in pennsylvania, about 18% -- there was a significant falloff in counties that have significant drilling.

it starts to impact other things and cut but -- back other jobs that are there. you have other jobs coming and that may not go to locals, they may go to people from out-of- state with more experience or go to locals but only short-term. host: a twitter comment -- guest: there is a tremendous amount of drilling on federal land, offshore in the gulf of mexico. the gulf of mexico is a giant journaling zone, and that belongs to the public. -- giant drilling zone. i think with the correspondent is referring to is whether or not we have drilling on places like the wildlife refuge or that has been a controversy for a long time because the

california, author coast of virginia -- off the coast. there is not consensus in favor of that drilling at this point. there is an amount of opposition to drilling off the coast in some parts of the country. host: oceanside, california, independent. caller: i want to talk about how california is being destroyed by illegal immigration. on fracking, when you start pumping thousands of water into small cracks for oil, it leaves big holes. you see that over and over again. things will start thinking and falling over. is that right? guest: i would say there are all sorts of things to be worried about regarding fracking.

there is also what do you do with the water once you pull it above ground. this is oil that has a lot more environmental consequences, and when you pull the -- some of the oil up, you have to separate out other components and that has environmental consequences. a lot of these wells have to be re-fracked after a year and a half. this is not like old oil wells. in texas, you could drill a well in the 1950s and he could beat reduce in today, maybe a lot of not --maybe not a lot. in the case of natural gas wells, they release about half of their gas in the first two years. with the oil wells and north dakota, some of them need to be re-fracked within a year. we are looking at oil that has a

much higher environmental cost, and we need to figure out how to calculate that in the cost. we are very focused on the price of gas at the pump, and we don't look at how even though this cast -- gas costs us four dollars, it may be costing us much more. host: this is a headline that was on the front page of the wall street journal yesterday -- host: their safety goes up because they don't take as many risks and they don't want fallout like in the gulf coast. guest: a big company like exxon has more on the line.

after the exxon about as spell, they put a lot of time and effort into figuring out how to find big mistakes that make them look bad. one of the things that has happened, you don't have as many big companies. you have a lot of small companies. the states cannot regulate. it is hard to regulate drilling. it is hard to know what is going on and understand it. you have to be someone who has worked on a drilling rig extensively to understand what is going on and will be dangerous and what not be. a lot of times, even following best practices is voluntary and some states. that is bad for the oil industry in general and companies like exxon are going to be hyperaware of that. it is also bad for people who happen to be unlucky to live on top of the land that is being drilled by the companies that are not following best practices.

host: "washington post" has the story -- dave, you are up next. caller: i was interested in listening to you speak about how the state of pennsylvania was late to the game relative to the issue of oil production or cracking -- fracking. i want to let you know that in first natural oil well was in pennsylvania, and the first oil well was in -- i lived in bradford, pennsylvania, in the 1970's. it was going on there that far back. i think to add to the conversation, i think the state of pennsylvania has had a long history of dealing with oil companies. if there are large companies

that are involved, i think that fracking could continue on with a high degree of safety, and it could be a win-win. host: lisa margonelli. guest: with effective regulation and taxing, it could be a win- win. there has to be effective regulation. there has to be some sort of uniform regulation to bring everybody up to code areas it is just not fair that some people happen to have exxon drilling have a better experience than the people down the road who have another company it. another issue with pennsylvania is they have this thriving oil industry and then they had companies, as the fuel industry died off, they have big companies like quaker who were lubricating oil because they're oil was a fine quality. those left 15 years ago.

the state of pennsylvania does not still have that expertise. the other thing that has happened -- they are doing better than some other states. pennsylvania chose not to tax those of gas wells. instead, they had a flat fee for each well. that does not benefit the people because you don't have the money to invest in better upkeep of the roads or to mitigate against some of the big social economic changes that happen. i don't actually see a completely gloomy future for fracking. it needs to be regulated

effectively. it can be a part of reducing pollution, reducing u.s. payments to foreign countries. we can cut back on coal use. it needs to be well-regulated and transparency about what the agreements are between the oil companies and the people who own the mineral rights. we need to be able to essentially see what the deals are and understand what is happening and understand what the chemicals are that are being put in the wells. host: sarasota florida, democratic caller. caller: i would like to suggest that the excess natural gas we are producing to be used -- not to be sent overseas as a liquid natural gas but to be used to produce methanol, the fuel of choice. that decision was made back in the late 1970's and 1980 svs --

1980's. the end result was cheaper and far more safe. it was 10 times less likely to catch on fire if you had an accident and much better condition for the engine in. the congress of the united states, a law was passed that it was legal to use a mixture to help pollution in california. presidents reagan and president bush in 1988 and 1989 strongly endorsed it read -- it. a professor of chemistry in california in his book, the methanol economy, strongly shows

the chemical reasons why it makes sense to take natural gas and turn into methanol for cars. guest: that is interesting. i will have to google the history of methanol. i was not aware of that. i was not aware -- i was aware of some of it. it is a great idea of using natural gas in trucking, especially in places like california, the port of long beach. that word has a tremendous amount of pollution around it, and saner levels. they can be cut significantly by running the big, heavy trucks on national -- natural gas. that could be a benefit and we could start to in the -- integrate biogas into the trucking corridor.

host: a twitter comment on the oil and gas market -- guest: yeah. well, to respond to the first tweet, i think that we do have to respond to this new reality. we also have to realize an energy policy -- policy should not be completely determined by who is putting a drill bit in the ground. an energy policy is deciding what we want to do and where we want to be in 20 or 30 years. where we are today is a result of people making decisions 20 years ago to invest in fracking and investing and natural gas, creating a big, robust market

for natural gas power plants in the u.s. we need to figure out where we want to be 20 years from now, and then have an actual policy that goes towards it am a rather than willy-nilly, saying we are producing gas now and producing oil and we don't have to worry about conservation and the climate change and all these other things. we have a big are breathing down our next. there has been a significant amount of earthquakes in the fracking zone. there needs to be more public knowledge and we need more records of it and an understanding of the before and after. some places in the country are getting drilled at the rate of one well every quarter-mile, and they are branching horizontally. this is an extreme impact on the landscape. we need to understand better how it works and what causes the

seismic failures. host: wisconsin, independent. caller: anybody who has any idea that this fracking business is a good idea, please go to something called linktv and watch a program called fracking. to imply that companies like exxon mobil, to use the words regulation and taxation together with their name is to -- is quite a joke. let's be honest, they are the ones who basically run this country. for them to be taxed and to talk about regulation, from what we have seen in the last 20 years, just go back to the mess that we

had in the gulf is pretty much a joke. why are we still talking about taxation and regulation for these large corporations when all they do is destroy the land? when they have realized they cannot get another drop of oil or gas out of the area, they leave and they leave these communities devastated. the people are sick and have cancer rates that are going through the roof. host: a twitter comment -- guest: that is true. one thing that is troubling, ohio has a two percent tax on gas production. for the first two years, protection from a well is half that, one percent. that means during the time when the well is producing 60% of its total production, they are getting the taxes. in a sense, we are missing the

boat on taxes. it needs to be taxed at a higher rate. if you look at a place -- anytime you put oil in your tank, anytime you need a lettuce salad with organic greens, anytime you do almost anything in this country, you are using oil. that oil all comes from somebody's backyard. when we don't drill in the u.s., we essentially offshore the troubles and we are getting it from nigeria, angola, saudi arabia and from canada. all of that oil has an of our mental cost. cost.generally speaking when we -- has an environmental cost.generally speaking when we import the fuel, somebody else is bearing the environmental cost. we need to make sure that it is fair will me produce the stuff

here in the u.s., that the people living above the wells do not bear all that environment will cost. it needs to go on us. that is one of the things that is missing, it all comes from somewhere. something awful happens everywhere it came from. some places are cleaner than others. drilling in the u.s. is cleaner, and more heavily regulated than in other countries. if you go to nigeria and you see what is happened in the niger delta, the number of spills, every year they have had a combination of spills roughly equal to the exxon valdez. they have huge flares burning. they take a big pollution and economic hit. when you look at what is happening in other places that we get oil from, you say, well, what we really need to do is stop using so much oil. everybody needs to cut back and started transition to cleaner

fuel. we need to started transition to something with lower carbon when we produce it and burn it. the impact of driving a car is a phenomenal. the health impacts of burning a gallon of gasoline are around $.27 a gallon. that is what we are paying in our insurance costs. we need to somehow figure out how to tax it, regulate it and use it more effectively. we need a strategy that gets us to where we want to be 20 years from now. host: a twitter comment -- host: peter in new york, republican. caller: yes, i tuned in a little late, so i don't know if you addressed this earlier. i understand that congress is going to allow the industry to build 16 looking for acacia plants and export natural --

liquification plant. my understanding is that gas is at its lowest price in 30 years. my concern is they start exporting it, the price will go through the roof. right now, the american people are benefiting from these lower prices. also, manufacturing may come back as a result of lower energy costs. i called my congressman and senators and said i don't think it is a good idea. we have about a 100-year supply of natural gas. the american people have not been informed on this issue, unless you read the wall street journal. host: lisa margonelli. guest: you touch up on an interesting issue. the whole way that we have talked about energy independence, the problem is we're too dependent dependent on other suppliers like saudi arabia and this, misys us.

as a result, we have a bunch of laws in place that prevent the x export of oil and natural gas. the law around the export of oil are kind of patchy. in the past year and a half or so, the u.s. has exported more gasoline every day than at any time since world war ii. we have become an exporter because we have access refinery capacity. -- excess capacity. this is what has kept prices quite high. it used to be that we all got a break in the price, and we are not getting that anymore. we are competing with every place in the world that has a gasoline shortage. the same thing is happening with natural gas. a glut of natural gas is a benefit to the consumer. the price falls to two dollars a

unit. the problem is, the cycles of price and drilling are very dicey. if the price goes down to $2 a unit for natural gas, people will stop drilling and the price will go back up. there is some of the more international for people who may be global marketers, what the gas to go overseas. it is not good for consumers. on the one hand, this is being sold to consumers as it will be good and cheap. on the other hand, we are exporting as much as we can to keep the prices high. host: you are getting into a conflict cycle. i want to jump it because we're are running out of time. here is a headline in the

"washington times" -- on twitter, american hero says -- another treat -- tweet -- >> it is probably why miners are losing their jobs. the coal industry need to be more rightly -- heavily regulated. the exxon spill is terrible and we